University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


THE    MIRROR 

OF 

THE    SEA 


BY 


Joseph   Conrad 

Author  of  "Nostromo"  etc. 


NEW  YORK  AND  LONDON 
HARPER  &■  BROTHERS  PUBLISHERS 


Books  by 
JOSEPH  CONRAD 

NOSTROMO.     Post  8vo 
THE   MIRROR   OF   THE   SEA.     Post  8vo 
THE   SECRET  AGENT.     Post  8vo 
UNDER   WESTERN   EYES.     Post  8vo 
A   PERSONAL   RECORD.     Crown  8vo 


HARPER  &  BROTHERS,   NEW   YORK 


t*MH-»H  * 


Copyright,  1906,  by  Harper  &  Brothers. 
Published  October,  1906. 

PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


Contents 

PAGE 

Landfalls  and  Departures i 

Emblems  of  Hope 18 

The  Fine  Art. 35 

Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 56 

The  Weight  of  the  Burden 74 

Overdue  and  Missing 93 

The  Grip  of  the  Land 109 

The  Character  of  the  Foe 117 

Rulers  of  East  and  West 132 

The  Faithful  River 168 

In  Captivity 193 

Initiation 216 

The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 250 

The  "Tremolino".     .     .     .  '".'  V" 262 

The  Heroic  Age.     . 310 


445411 


The   Mirror  of   the   Sea 


Landfalls    and    Departures 


\  ANDFALL  and  Departure  mark 
the  rhythmical  swing  of  a  sea- 
man's life  and  of  a  ship's  ca- 
reer. From  land  to  land  is 
the  most  concise  definition  of 
a  ship's  earthly  fate. 

A  " Departure"  is  not  what  a  vain  people 
of  landsmen  may  think.  The  term  "Land- 
fall" is  more  easily  understood;  you  fall  in 
with  the  land,  and  it  is  a  matter  of  a  quick 
eye  and  of  a  clear  atmosphere.  The  De- 
parture is  not  the  ship's  going  away  from 
her  port  any  more  than  the  Landfall  can 
be  looked  upon  as  the  synonyme  of  arrival. 
But  there  is  this  difference  in  the  Departure : 
that  the  term  does  not  imply  so  much  a  sea 
event  as  a  definite  act  entailing  a  process — 
the  precise  observation  of  certain  landmarks 
by  means  of  the  compass-card. 

i 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Your  Landfall,  be  it  a  peculiarly  shaped 
mountain,  a  rocky  headland,  or  a  stretch  of 
sand-dunes,  you  meet  at  first  with  a  single 
glance.  Further  recognition  will  follow  in 
due  course;  but  essentially  a  Landfall,  good 
or  bad,  is  made  and  done  with  at  the  first  cry 
of  "Land  ho!"  The  Departure  is  distinctly 
a  ceremony  of  navigation.  A  ship  may  have 
left  her  port  some  time  before ;  she  may  have 
been  at  sea,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  phrase, 
for  days;  but,  for  all  that,  as  long  as  the 
coast  she  was  about  to  leave  remained  in 
sight,  a  southern-going  ship  of  yesterday 
had  not  in  the  sailor's  sense  begun  the  en- 
terprise of  a  passage. 

The  taking  of  Departure,  if  not  the  last 
sight  of  the  land,  is  perhaps  the  last  pro- 
fessional recognition  of  the  land  on  the  part 
of  a  sailor.  It  is  the  technical,  as  distin- 
guished from  the  sentimental,  "good-bye." 
Henceforth  he  has  done  with  the  coast  astern 
of  his  ship.  It  is  a  matter  personal  to  the 
man.  It  is  not  the  ship  that  takes  her  de- 
parture ;  the  seaman  takes  his  Departure  by 
means  of  cross-bearings  which  fix  the  place 
of  the  first  tiny  pencil-cross  on  the  white  ex- 
? 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

panse  of  the  track -chart,  where  the  ship's 
position  at  noon  shall  be  marked  by  just  such 
another  tiny  pencil -cross  for  every  day  of 
her  passage.  And  there  may  be  sixty, 
eighty,  any  number  of  these  crosses  on  the 
ship's  track  from  land  to  land.  The  great- 
est number  in  my  experience  was  a  hundred 
and  thirty  of  such  crosses  from  the  pilot 
station  at  the  Sand  Heads  in  the  Bay  of 
Bengal  to  the  Scilly's  light.  A  bad  pas- 
sage. .  .  . 

A  Departure,  the  last  professional  sight  of 
land,  is  always  good,  or  at  least  good  enough. 
For,  even  if  the  weather  be  thick,  it  does 
not  matter  much  to  a  ship  having  all  the  sea 
open  before  her  bows.  A  Landfall  may  be 
good  or  bad.  You  encompass  the  earth 
with  one  particular  spot  of  it  in  your  eye. 
In  all  the  devious  tracings  the  course  of  a 
sailing-ship  leaves  upon  the  white  paper  of  a 
chart  she  is  always  aiming  for  that  one  little 
spot — maybe  a  small  island  in  the  ocean,  a 
single  headland  upon  the  long  coast  of  a 
continent,  a  light-house  on  a  bluff,  or  simply 
the  peaked  form  of  a  mountain  like  an  ant- 
heap  afloat  upon  the  waters.  But  if  you 
3. 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

have  sighted  it  on  the  expected  bearing, 
then  that  Landfall  is  good.  Fogs,  snow- 
storms, gales  thick  with  clouds  and  rain — 
those  are  the  enemies  of  good  Landfalls. 


Some  commanders  of  ships  take  their  De- 
parture from  the  home  coast  sadly,  in  a 
spirit  of  grief  and  discontent.  They  have 
a  wife,  children  perhaps,  some  affection  at 
any  rate,  or  perhaps  only  some  pet  vice, 
that  must  be  left  behind  for  a  year  or  more. 
J  I  remember  only  one  man  who  walked  his 
deck  with  a  springy  step  and  gave  the  first 
course  of  the  passage  in  an  elated  voice. 
But  he,  as  I  learned  afterwards,  was  leaving 
nothing  behind  him,  except  a  welter  of  debts 
and  threats  of  legal  proceedings. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  have  known  many 
captains  who,  directly  their  ship  had  left  the 
narrow  waters  of  the  Channel,  would  dis- 
appear from  the  sight  of  their  ship's  com- 
pany altogether  for  some  three  days  or  more. 
They  would  take  a  long  dive,  as  it  were,  into 
their  state-room,  only  to  emerge  a  few  days 
4 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

afterwards  with  a  more  or  less  serene  brow. 
Those  were  the  men  easy  to  get  on  with. 
Besides,  such  a  complete  retirement  seemed 
to  imply  a  satisfactory  amount  of  trust  in 
their  officers,  and  to  be  trusted  displeases  no 
seaman  worthy  of  the  name. 

On  my  first  voyage  as  chief  mate  with 

good  Captain  MacW ,  I  remember  that  I 

felt  quite  flattered,  and  went  blithely  about 
my  duties,  myself  a  commander  for  all  prac- 
tical purposes.  Still,  whatever  the  great-, 
ness  of  my  illusion,  the  fact  remained  that 
the  real  commander  was  there,  backing  up 
my  self-confidence,  though  invisible  to  my 
eyes  behind  a  maple-wood  veneered  cabin- 
door  with  a  white  china  handle. 

That  is  the  time,  after  your  Departure  is 
taken,  when  the  spirit  of  your  commander 
communes  with  you  in  a  muffled  voice,  as  if 
from  the  sanctum  sanctorum  of  a  temple; 
because,  call  her  a  temple  or  a  "hell  afloat" 
—as  some  ships  have  been  called — the  cap- 
tain's state-room  is  surely  the  august  place 
in  every  vessel. 

The    good    MacW would    not    even 

come  out  to  his  meals,  and  fed  solitarily  in 
5 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

his  holy  of  holies  from  a  tray  covered  with 
a  white  napkin.  Our  steward  used  to  bend 
an  ironic  glance  at  the  perfectly  empty 
plates  he  was  bringing  out  from  there. 
This  grief  for  his  home,  which  overcomes  so 
many  married  seamen,  did  not  deprive  Cap- 
tain MacW of  his  legitimate  appetite. 

In  fact,  the  steward  would  almost  invariably 
come  up  to  me,  sitting  in  the  captain's  chair 
at  the  head  of  the  table,  to  say  in  a  grave 
murmur,  "The  captain  asks  for  one  more 
slice  of  meat  and  two  potatoes."  We,  his 
officers,  could  hear  him  moving  about  in  his 
berth,  or  lightly  snoring,  or  fetching  deep 
sighs,  or  splashing  and  blowing  in  his  bath- 
room; and  we  made  our  reports  to  him 
through  the  key-hole,  as  it  were.  It  was  the 
crowning  achievement  of  his  amiable  char- 
acter that  the  answers  we  got  were  given  in 
a  quite  mild  and  friendly  tone.  Some  com- 
manders in  their  periods  of  seclusion  are  con- 
stantly grumpy,  and  seem  to  resent  the  mere 
sound  of  your  voice  as  an  injury  and  an  insult. 
But  a  grumpy  recluse  cannot  worry  his 
subordinates:  whereas  the  man  in  whom  the 
sense  of  duty  is  strong  (or,  perhaps,  only  the 
6 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

sense  of  self-importance),  and  who  persists 
in  airing  on  deck  his  moroseness  all  day — 
and  perhaps  half  the  night  —  becomes  a 
grievous  infliction.  He  walks  the  poop 
darting  gloomy  glances,  as  though  he  wished 
to  poison  the  sea,  and  snaps  your  head  off 
savagely  whenever  you  happen  to  blunder 
within  ear-shot.  And  these  vagaries  are  the 
harder  to  bear  patiently,  as  becomes  a  man 
and  an  officer,  because  no  sailor  is  really 
good-tempered  during  the  first  few  days  of 
a  voyage.  There  are  regrets,  memories,  the 
instinctive  longing  for  the  departed  idleness, 
the  instinctive  hate  of  all  work.  Besides, 
things  have  a  knack  of  going  wrong  at  the 
start,  especially  in  the  matter  of  irritating 
trifles.  And  there  is  the  abiding  thought  of 
a  whole  year  of  more  or  less  hard  life  before 
one,  because  there  was  hardly  a  southern- 
going  voyage  in  the  yesterday  of  the  sea 
which  meant  anything  less  than  a  twelve- 
month. -Yes;  it  needed  a  few  days  after  the 
taking  of  your  departure  for  a  ship's  com- 
pany to  shake  down  into  their  places,  and 
for  the  soothing  deep-water  ship  routine  to 
establish  its  beneficent  sway. 
7 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

It  is  a  great  doctor  for  sore  hearts  and 
sore  heads,  too,  your  ship's  routine,  which  I 
have  seen  soothe — at  least  for  a  time — the 
most  turbulent  of  spirits.  There  is  health 
in  it,  and  peace,  and  satisfaction  of  the  ac- 
complished round;  for  each  day  of  the  ship's 
life  seems  to  close  a  circle  within  the  wide 
ring  of  the  sea-horizon.  It  borrows  a  cer- 
tain dignity  of  sameness  from  the  majestic 
monotony  of  the  sea.  He  who  loves  the  sea 
loves  also  the  ship's  routine. 

Nowhere  else  than  upon  the  sea  do  the 
days,  weeks,  and  months  fall  away  quicker 
into  the  past.  They  seem  to  be  left  astern 
as  easily  as  the  light  air -bubbles  in  the 
swirls  of  the  ship's  wake,  and  vanish  into  a 
great  silence  in  which  your  ship  moves  on 
with  a  sort  of  magical  effect.  They  pass 
away,  the  days,  the  weeks,  the  months. 
Nothing  but  a  gale  can  disturb  the  orderly 
life  of  the  ship;  and  the  spell  of  unshaken 
monotony  that  seems  to  have  fallen  upon 
the  very  voices  of  her  men  is  broken  only  by 
the  near  prospect  of  a  Landfall. 

Then  is  the  spirit  of  the  ship's  commander 
stirred  strongly  again.  But  it  is  not  moved 
8 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

to  seek  seclusion,  and  to  remain,  hidden  and 
inert,  shut  up  in  a  small  cabin  with  the  solace 
of  a  good  bodily  appetite.  When  about  to 
make  the  land,,  the  spirit  of  the  ship's  com- 
mander is  tormented  by  an  unconquerable 
restlessness.  It  seems  unable  to  abide  for 
many  seconds  together  in  the  holy  of  holies 
of  the  captain's  state-room;  it  will  out  on 
deck  and  gaze  •  ahead,  through  straining 
eyes,  as  the  appointed  moment  comes 
nearer.  It  is  kept  vigorously  upon  the 
stretch  of  excessive  vigilance.  Meantime 
the  body  of  the  ship's  commander  is  being 
enfeebled  by  want  of  appetite ;  at  least,  such 
is  my  experience,  though  " enfeebled"  is 
perhaps  not  exactly  the  word.  I  might  say, 
rather,  that  it  is  spiritualized  by  a  disregard 
for  food,  sleep,  and  all  the  ordinary  com- 
forts, such  as  they  are,  of  sea-life.  In  one  or 
two  cases  I  have  known  that  detachment 
from  the  grosser  needs  of  existence  remain 
regrettably  incomplete  in  the  matter  of 
drink. 

But  these  two  cases  were,  properly  speak- 
ing, pathological  cases,  and  the  only  two  in 
all  my  sea  experience.     In  one  of  these  two 
9 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

instances  of  a .  craving  for  stimulants,  de- 
veloped from  sheer  anxiety,  I  cannot  assert 
that  the  man's  seaman-like  qualities  were 
impaired  in  the  least.  It  was  a  very  anx- 
ious case,  too,  the  land  being  made  sud- 
denly, close-to,  on  a  wrong  bearing,  in  thick 
weather,  and  during  a  fresh  on-shore  gale. 
Going  below  to  speak  to  him  soon  after,  I 
was  unlucky  enough  to  catch  my  captain  in 
the  very  act  of  hasty  cork-drawing.  The 
sight,  I  may  say,  gave  me  an  awful  scare.  I 
was  well  aware  of  the  morbidly  sensitive 
nature  of  the  man.  Fortunately,  I  man- 
aged to  draw  back  unseen,  and,  taking  care 
to  stamp  heavily  with  my  sea-boots  at  the 
foot  of  the  cabin  stairs,  I  made  my  second 
entry.  But  for  this  unexpected  glimpse,  no 
act  of  his  during  the  next  twenty-four  hours 
could  have  given  me  the  slightest  suspicion 
that  all  was  not  well  with  his  nerve. 


Quite  another  case,  and  having  nothing 
to  do  with  drink,  was  that  of  poor  Captain 
B .     He  used  to  suffer  from  sick  head- 

IO 


Landfalls    and   Departures 

aches,  in  his  young  days,  every  time  he  was 
approaching  a  coast.  Well  over  fifty  years 
of  age  when  I  knew  him,  short,  stout,  dig- 
nified, perhaps  a  little  pompous,  he  was  a 
man  of  a  singularly  well-informed  mind,  the 
least  sailor-like  in  outward  aspect,  but  cer- 
tainly one  of  the  best  seamen  whom  it  has 
been  my  good  luck  to  serve  under.  He  was 
a  Plymouth  man,  I  think,  the  son  of  a 
country  doctor,  and  both  his  elder  boys  were 
studying  medicine.  He  commanded  a  big 
London  ship,  fairly  well  known  in  her  day. 
I  thought  no  end  of  him,  and  that  is  why  I 
remember  with  a  peculiar  satisfaction  the 
last  words  he  spoke  to  me  on  board  his  ship 
after  an  eighteen  months'  voyage.  It  was 
in  the  dock  in  Dundee,  where  we  had 
brought  a  full  cargo  of  jute  from  Calcutta. 
We  had  been  paid  off  that  morning,  and  I 
had  come  on  board  to  take  my  sea-chest 
away  and  to  say  good-bye.  In  his  slightly 
lofty  but  courteous  way  he  inquired  what 
were  my  plans.  I  replied  that  I  intended 
leaving  for  London  by  the  afternoon  train, 
and  thought  of  going  up  for  examination  to 
get    my    master's    certificate.     I    had   just 

a  II 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

enough  service  for  that.  He  commended  me 
for  not  wasting  my  time,  with  such  an  evi- 
dent interest  in  my  case  that  I  was  quite 
surprised;  then,  rising  from  his  chair,  he 
said: 

"Plave  you  a  ship  in  view  after  you  have 
passed?" 

I  answered  that  I  had  nothing  whatever 
in  view. 

He  shook  hands  with  me,  and  pronounced 
the  memorable  words: 

"If  you  happen  to  be  in  want  of  employ- 
ment, remember  that  as  long  as  I  have  a 
ship  you  have  a  ship,  too." 

In  the  way  of  compliment  there  is  nothing 
to  beat  this  from  a  ship's  captain  to  his 
second  mate  at  the  end  of  a  voyage,  when 
the  work  is  over  and  the  subordinate  is  done 
with.  And  there  is  a  pathos  in  that  mem- 
ory, for  the  poor  fellow  never  went  to  sea 
again  after  all.  He  was  already  ailing  when 
we  passed  St.  Helena ;  was  laid  up  for  a  time 
when  we  were  off  the  Western  Islands,  but 
got  out  of  bed  to  make  his  Landfall.  He 
managed  to  keep  up  on  deck  as  far  as  the 
Downs,  where,  giving  his  orders  in  an  ex- 
12 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

hausted  voice,  he  anchored  for  a  few  hours 
to  send  a  wire  to  his  wife  and  take  aboard  a 
North  Sea  pilot  to  help  him  sail  the  ship  up 
the  east  coast.  He  had  not  felt  equal  to  the 
task  by  himself,  for  it  is  the  sort  of  thing 
that  keeps  a  deep-water  man  on  his  feet 
pretty  well  night  and  day. 

When  we  arrived  in  Dundee,  Mrs.  B 

was  already  there,  waiting  to  take  him 
home.  We  travelled  up  to  London  by  the 
same  train;  but  by  the  time  I  had  managed 
to  get  through  with  my  examination  the 
ship  had  sailed  on  her  next  voyage  without 
him,  and,  instead  of  joining  her  again,  I 
went  by  request  to  see  my  old  commander 
in  his  home.  This  is  the  only  one  of  my  cap- 
tains I  have  ever  visited  in  that  way.  He 
was  out  of  bed  by  then,  "quite  convales- 
cent,''  as  he  declared,  making  a  few  tottering 
steps  to  meet  me  at  the  sitting-room  door. 
Evidently  he  was  reluctant  to  take  his  final 
cross-bearings  of  this  earth  for  a  Departure 
on  the  only  voyage  to  an  unknown  destina- 
tion a  sailor  ever  undertakes.  And  it  was 
all  very  nice — the  large,  sunny  room;  his 
deep  easy-chair  in  a  bow-window,  with  pil- 
13 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

lows  and  a  footstool;  the  quiet,  watchful 
care  of  the  elderly,  gentle  woman  who  had 
borne  him  five  children,  and  had  not,  per- 
haps, lived  with  him  more  than  five  full 
years  out  of  the  thirty  or  so  of  their  married 
life.  There  was  also  another  woman  there 
in  a  plain  black  dress,  quite  gray-haired,  sit- 
ting very  erect  on  her  chair  with  some  sew- 
ing, from  which  she  snatched  side  glances  in 
his  direction,  and  uttering  not  a  single  word 
during  all  the  time  of  my  call.  Even  when, 
in  due  course,  I  carried  over  to  her  a  cup  of 
tea,  she  only  nodded  at  me  silently,  with  the 
faintest  ghost  of  a  smile  on  her  tight-set  lips. 
I  imagine  she  must  have  been  a  maiden 

sister  of  Mrs.  B come  to  help  nurse  her 

brother-in-law.  His  youngest  boy,  a  late- 
comer, a  great  cricketer  it  seemed,  twelve 
years  old  or  thereabouts,  chattered  enthu- 
siastically of  the  exploits  of  W.  G.  Grace. 
And  I  remember  his  eldest  son,  too,  a  newly 
fledged  doctor,  who  took  me  out  to  smoke  in 
the  garden,  and,  shaking  his  head  with  pro- 
fessional gravity,  but  with  genuine  concern, 
muttered:  "Yes,  but  he  doesn't  get  back  his 
appetite.  I  don't  like  that  —  I  don't  like 
14 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

that  at  all . ' '     The  last  sight  of  Captain  B 

I  had  was  as  he  nodded  his  head  to  me  out 
of  the  bow-window  when  I  turned  round  to 
close  the  front  gate. 

It  was  a  distinct  and  complete  impression, 
something  that  I  don't  know  whether  to  call 
a  Landfall  or  a  Departure.  Certainly  he  had 
gazed  at  times  very  fixedly  before  him  with 
the  Landfall's  vigilant  look,  this  sea-captain 
seated  incongruously  in  a  deep-backed  chair. 
He  had  not  then  talked  to  me  of  employ- 
ment, of  ships,  of  being  ready  to  take  an- 
other command;  but  he  had  discoursed  of 
his  early  days  in  the  abundant  but  thin  flow 
of  a  wilful  invalid's  talk.  The  women  looked 
worried,  but  sat  still,  and  I  learned  more  of 
him  in  that  interview  than  in  the  whole 
eighteen  months  we  had  sailed  together.  It 
appeared  he  had  "served  his  time"  in  the 
copper  -  ore  trade,  the  famous  copper  -  ore 
trade  of  old  days  between  Swansea  and  the 
Chilian  coast,  coal  out  and  ore  in,  deep- 
loaded  both  ways,  as  if  in  wanton  defiance 
of  the  great  Cape  Horn  seas — a  work,  this, 
for  stanch  ships,  and  a  great  school  of 
stanchness  for  West  -  Country  seamen.  A 
J5 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

whole  fleet  of  copper-bottomed  barks,  as 
strong  in  rib  and  planking,  as  well  found  in 
gear,  as  ever  was  sent  upon  the  seas,  manned 
by  hardy  crews  and  commanded  by  young 
masters,  was  engaged  in  that  now  long-de- 
funct trade.  "That  was  the  school  I  was 
trained  in,"  he  said  to  me  almost  boastfully, 
lying  back  among  his  pillows  with  a  rug  over 
his  legs.  And  it  was  in  that  trade  that  he 
obtained  his  first  command  at  a  very  early 
age.  It  was  then  that  he  mentioned  to  me 
how,  as  a  young  commander,  he  was  always 
ill  for  a  few  days  before  making  land  after 
a  long  passage.  But  this  sort  of  sickness 
used  to  pass  off  with  the  first  sight  of  a  fa- 
miliar landmark.  Afterwards,  he  added,  as 
he  grew  older,  all  that  nervousness  wore  off 
completely;  and  I  observed  his  weary  eyes 
gaze  steadily  ahead,  as  if  there  had  been 
nothing  between  him  and  the  straight  line  of 
sea  and  sky,  where  whatever  a  seaman  is 
looking  for  is  first  bound  to  appear.  But  I 
have  also  seen  his  eyes  rest  fondly  upon  the 
faces  in  the  room,  upon  the  pictures  on  the 
wall,  upon  all  the  familiar  objects  of  that 
home,  whose  abiding  and  clear  image  must 
j6 


Landfalls  and  Departures 

have  flashed  often  on  his  memory  in  times 
of  stress  and  anxiety  at  sea.  Was  he  look- 
ing out  for  a  strange  Landfall,  or  taking 
with  an  untroubled  mind  the  bearings  for 
his  last  Departure? 

It  is  hard  to  say;  for  in  that  voyage  from 
which  no  man  returns  Landfall  and  De- 
parture are  instantaneous,  merging  togeth- 
er into  one  moment  of  supreme  and  final 
attention.  Certainly  I  do  not  remember 
observing  any  sign  of  faltering  in  the  set 
expression  of  his  wasted  face,  no  hint  of 
the  nervous  anxiety  of  a- young  commander 
about  to  make  land  on  an  uncharted  shore. 
He  had  had  too  much  experience  of  De- 
partures and  Landfalls.  And  had  he  not 
" served  his  time"  in  the  famous  copper-ore 
trade  out  of  the  Bristol  Channel,  the  work 
of  the  stanchest  ships  afloat,  and  the  school 
of  stanch  seamen? 


Emblems   of   Hope 


IEFORE  an  anchor  can  ever  be 
raised,  it  must  be  let  go;  and 
this  perfectly  obvious  truism 
brings  me  at  once  to  the  sub- 
ject of  the  degradation  of  the 
sea  -  language  in  the  daily  press  of  this 
country. 

Your  journalist,  whether  he  takes  charge 
of  a  ship  or  a  fleet,  almost  invariably  " casts" 
his  anchor.  Now,  an  anchor  is  never  cast, 
and  to  take  a  liberty  with  technical  language 
is  a  crime  against  the  clearness,  precision, 
and  beauty  of  perfected  speech. 

An  anchor  is  a  forged  piece  of  iron,  ad- 
mirably adapted  to  its  end,  and  technical 
language  is  an  instrument  wrought  into  per- 
fection by  ages  of  experience,  a  flawless 
thing  for  its  purpose.  An  anchor  of  yester- 
day (because  nowadays  there  are  contriv- 
18 


Emblems  of  Hope 

ances  like  mushrooms  and  things  like  claws, 
of  no  particular  expression  or  shape — just 
hooks) — an  anchor  of  yesterday  is  in  its  way 
a  most  efficient  instrument.  To  its  perfec- 
tion its  size  bears  witness,  for  there  is  no 
other  appliance  so  small  for  the  great  work 
it  has  to  do.  Look  at  the  anchors  hanging 
from  the  cat-heads  of  a  big  ship!  How  tiny 
they  are  in  proportion  to  the  great  size  of 
the  hull!  Were  they  made  of  gold  they 
would  look  like  trinkets,  like  ornamental 
toys,  no  bigger  in  proportion  than  a  jewelled 
drop  in  a  woman's  ear.  And  yet  upon  them 
will  depend,  more  than  once,  the  very  life  of 
the  ship. 

An  anchor  is  forged  and  fashioned  for 
faithfulness;  give  it  ground  that  it  can  bite, 
and  it  will  hold  till  the  cable  parts,  and  then, 
whatever  may  afterwards  befall  its  ship, 
that  anchor  is  "lost."  The  honest,  rough 
piece  of  iron,  so  simple  in  appearance,  has 
more  parts  than  the  human  body  has  limbs: 
the  ring,  the  stock,  the  crown,  the  flukes, 
the  palms,  the  shank.  All  this,  according 
to  the  journalist,  is  "cast"  when  a  ship  ar- 
riving at  an  anchorage  is  brought  up. 
19 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

This  insistence  in  using  the  odious  word 
arises  from  the  fact  that  a  particularly  be- 
nighted landsman  must  imagine  the  act  of 
anchoring  as  a  process  of  throwing  some- 
thing overboard,  whereas  the  anchor  ready 
for  its  work  is  already  overboard,  and  is  not 
thrown  over,  but  simply  allowed  to  fall.  It 
hangs  from  the  ship's  side  at  the  end  of  a 
heavy,  projecting  timber  called  the  cat-head, 
in  the  bight  of  a  short,  thick  chain  whose 
end  link  is  suddenly  released  by  a  blow  from 
a  top-mall  or  the  pull  of  a  lever  when  the 
order  is  given.  And  the  order  is  not  "  Heave 
over!"  as  the  paragraphist  seems  to  imagine, 
but  "Let  go!" 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  nothing  is  ever  cast 
in  that  sense  on  board  ship  but  the  lead,  of 
which  a  cast  is  taken  to  search  the  depth  of 
water  on  which  she  floats.  A  lashed  boat, 
a  spare  spar,  a  cask  or  what  not  secured 
about  the  decks,  is  "cast  adrift"  when  it  is 
untied.  Also  the  ship  herself  is  "cast  to 
port  or  starboard"  when  getting  under  way. 
She,  however,  never  "casts"  her  anchor. 

To  speak  with  severe  technicality,  a  ship 
or  a  fleet  is  "brought  up" — the  comple* 
20 


Emblems  of  Hope 

mentary  words  unpronounced  and  unwrit- 
ten being,  of  course,  "to  an  anchor."  Less 
technically,  but  not  less  correctly,  the  word 
"anchored,"  with  its  characteristic  appear- 
ance and  resolute  sound,  ought  to  be  good 
enough  for  the  newspapers  of  the  greatest 
maritime  country  in  the  world.  "The  fleet 
anchored  at  Spithead":  can  any  one  want  a 
better  sentence  for  brevity  and  seaman-like 
ring?  But  the  "cast-anchor"  trick,  with  its 
affectation  of  being  a  sea-phrase — for  why 
not  write  just  as  well  "threw  anchor," 
"flung  anchor,"  or  " shied  anchor " ?  —  is 
intolerably  odious  to  a  sailor's  ear.  I  re- 
member a  coasting  pilot  of  my  early  ac- 
quaintance (he  used  to  read  the  papers 
assiduously)  who,  to  define  the  utmost  de- 
gree of  lubberliness  in  a  landsman,  used 
to  say,r"He's  one  of  them  poor,  miserable, 
1  cast-anchor '  devils." 


From  first  to  last  the  seaman's  thoughts 
are  very  much  concerned  with  his  anchors. 
Jt  is  not  so  much  that  the  anchor  is  a  symbol 

31 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

of  hope  as  that  it  is  the  heaviest  object  that 
he  has  to  handle  on  board  his  ship  at  sea  in 
the  usual  routine  of  his  duties.  The  begin- 
ning and  the  end  of  every  passage  are 
marked  distinctly  by  work  about  the  ship's 
anchors.  A  vessel  in  the  Channel  has  her 
anchors  always  ready,  her  cables  shackled 
on,  and  the  land  almost  always  in  sight. 
The  anchor  and  the  land  are  indissolubly 
connected  in  a  sailor's  thoughts.  But  direct- 
ly she  is  clear  of  the  narrow  seas,  heading 
out  into  the  world,  with  nothing  solid  to 
speak  of  between  .her  and  the  south  pole, 
the  anchors  are  got  in  and  the  cables  dis- 
appear from  the  deck.  But  the  anchors  do 
not  disappear.  Technically  speaking,  they 
are  "secured  in-board";  and,  on  the  fore- 
castle head,  lashed  down  to  ring-bolts  with 
ropes  and  chains,  under  the  straining  sheets 
of  the  head-sails,  they  look  very  idle  and  as 
if  asleep.  Thus  bound,  but  carefully  looked 
after,  inert  and  powerful,  those  emblems  of 
hope  make  company  for  the  look-out  man 
in  the  night  watches;  and  so  the  days  glide 
by,  with  a  long  rest  for  those  characteristi- 
cally shaped  pieces  of  iron,  reposing  forward, 
22 


Emblems  of  Hope 

visible  from  almost  every  part  of  the  ship's 
deck,  waiting  for  their  work  on  the  other 
side  of  the  world  somewhere,  while  the  ship 
carries  them  on  with  a  great  rush  and  splut- 
ter of  foam  underneath,  and  the  sprays  of 
the  open  sea  rust  their  heavy  limbs. 

The  first  approach  to  the  land,  as  yet  in- 
visible to  the  crew's  eyes,  is  announced  by 
the  brisk  order-  of  the  chief  mate  to  the 
boatswain:  "We  will  get  the  anchors  over 
this  afternoon"  or  "first  thing  to-morrow 
morning,"  as  the  case  may  be.  For  the 
chief  mate  is  the  keeper  of  the  ship's  anchors 
and  the  guardian  of  her  cable.  There  are; 
good  ships  and  bad  ships,  comfortable  ships 
and  ships  where,  from  first  day  to  last  of  the 
voyage,  there  is  no  rest  for  a  chief  mate's 
body  and  soul.  And  ships  are  what  men 
make  them:  this  is  a  pronouncement  of 
sailor  wisdom,  and,  no  doubt,  in  the  main  it 
is  true. 

However,  there  are  ships  where,  as  an  old, 
grizzled  mate  once  told  me,  "nothing  ever 
seems  to  go  right!"  And,  looking  from  the 
poop  where  we  both  stood  (I  had  paid  him  a 
neighborly  call  in  dock),  he  added:  "She's 
23 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

one  of  them."  He  glanced  up  at  my  face, 
which  expressed  a  proper  professional  sym- 
pathy, and  set  me  right  in  my  natural  sur- 
mise: "Oh  no;  the  old  man's  right  enough. 
He  never  interferes.  Anything  that's  done 
in  a  seaman-like  way  is  good  enough  for  him. 
And  yet,  somehow,  nothing  ever  seems  to  go 
right  in  this  ship.  I  tell  you  what:  she  is 
naturally  unhandy." 

The  "old  man,"  of  course,  was  his  cap- 
tain, who  just  then  came  on  deck  in  a  silk 
hat  and  brown  overcoat,  and,  with  a  civil 
nod  to  us,  went  ashore.  He  was  certainly 
not  more  than  thirty,  and  the  elderly  mate, 
with  a  murmur  to  me  of  "That's  my  old 
man,"  proceeded  to  give  instances  of  the 
natural  unhandiness  of  the  ship  in  a  sort  of 
deprecatory  tone,  as  if  to  say,  M  You  mustn't 
think  I  bear  a  grudge  against  her  for 
that." 

The  instances  do  not  matter.  The  point 
is  that  there  are  ships  where  things  do  go 
wrong ;  but  whatever  the  ship — good  or  bad, 
lucky  or  unlucky — it  is  in  the  forepart  of 
her  that  her  chief  mate  feels  most  at  home. 
It  is  emphatically  his  end  of  the  ship, 
24 


Emblems  of  Hope 

though,  of  course,  he  is  the  executive  super- 
visor of  the  whole.  There  are  his  anchors, 
his  head-gear,  his  foremast,  his  station  for 
manoeuvring  when  the  captain  is  in  charge. 
And  there,  too,  live  the  men,  the  ship's 
hands,  whom  it  is  his  duty  to  keep  em- 
ployed, fair  weather  or  foul,  for  the  ship's 
welfare.  It  is  the  chief  mate,  the  only  figure 
of  the  ship's  afterguard,  who  comes  bustling 
forward  at  the  cry  of  "All  hands  on  deck!" 
He  is  the  satrap  of  that  province  in  the  auto- 
cratic realm  of  the  ship,  and  more  personally 
responsible  for  anything  that  may  happen 
there. 

There,  too,  on  the  approach  to  the  land, 
assisted  by  the  boatswain  and  the  carpenter, 
he  "gets  the  anchors  over"  with  the  men  of 
his  own  watch,  whom  he  knows  better  than 
the  others.  There  he  sees  the  cable  ranged, 
the  windlass  disconnected,  the  compressors 
opened;  and  there,  after  giving  his  own  last 
order,  "Stand  clear  of  the  cable!"  he  waits 
attentive,  in  a  silent  ship  that  forges  slowly 
ahead  towards  her  picked-out  berth,  for  the 
sharp  shout  from  aft,  "Let  go!"  Instantly 
bending  over,  he  sees  the  trusty  iron  fall 
25 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

with  a  heavy  plunge  under  his  eyes,  which 
watch  and  note  whether  it  has  gone  clear. 

For  the  anchor  "to  go  clear"  means  to  go 
clear  of  its  own  chain.  Your  anchor  must 
drop  from  the  bow  of  your  ship  with  no  turn 
of  cable  on  any  of  its  limbs,  else  you  would 
be  riding  to  a  foul  anchor.  Unless  the  pull 
of  the  cable  is  fair  on  the  ring,  no  anchor 
can  be  trusted  even  on  the  best  of  holding 
ground.  In  time  of  stress  it  is  bound  to 
drag,  for  implements  and  men  must  be 
treated  fairly  to  give  you  the  "virtue" 
which  is  in  them.  The  anchor  is  an  em- 
blem of  hope,  but  a  foul  anchor  is  worse 
than  the  most  fallacious  of  false  hopes  that 
ever  lured  men  or  nations  into  a  sense  of 
security.  And  the  sense  of  security,  even 
the  most  warranted,  is  a  bad  councillor.  It 
is  the  sense  which,  like  that  exaggerated  feel- 
ing of  well-being  ominous*  of  the  coming  on 
of  madness,  precedes  the  swift  fall  of  dis- 
aster. A  seaman  laboring  under  an  undue 
sense  of  security  becomes  at  once  worth 
hardly  half  his  salt.  Therefore,  of  all  my 
chief  officers,  the   one  I  trusted   most  was 

a  man  called  B .     He  had  a  red  mus- 

26 


Emblems  of  Hope 

tache,  a  lean  face,  also  red,  and  an  uneasy 
eye.     He  was  worth  all  his  salt.   • 

On  examining  now,  after  many  years,  the 
residue  of  the  feeling  which  was  the  outcome 
of  the  contact  of  our  personalities,  I  dis- 
cover, without  much  surprise,  a  certain 
flavor  of  dislike.  Upon  the  whole,  I  think 
he  was  one  of  the  most  uncomfortable  ship- 
mates possible  for  a  young  commander.  If 
it  is  permissible  to  criticise  the  absent,  I 
should  say  he  had  a  little  too  much  of  the 
sense  of  insecurity  which  is  so  invaluable  in 
a  seaman.  He  had  an  extremely  disturbing 
air  of  being  everlastingly  ready  (even  when 
seated  at  table  at  my  right  hand  before  a 
plate  of  salt  beef)  to  grapple  with  some  im- 
pending calamity.  I  must  hasten  to  add 
that  he  had  also  the  other  qualification 
necessary  to  make  a  trustworthy  seaman — 
that  of  an  absolute  confidence  in  himself. 
What  was  really  wrong  with  him  was  that 
he  had  these  qualities  in  an  unrestful  degree. 
His  eternally  watchful  demeanor,  his  jerky,, 
nervous  talk,  even  his,  as  it  were,  deter- 
mined silences,  seemed  to  imply — and,  I  be- 
lieve, they  did  imply — that  to  his  mind  the 

3  27 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ship  was  never  safe  in  my  hands.  Such  was 
the  man  who  looked  after  the  anchors  of  a 
less  than  five  -  hundred  -  ton  bark,  my  first 
command,  now  gone  from  the  face  of  the 
earth,  but  sure  of  a  tenderly  remembered 
existence  as  long  as  I  live.     No  anchor  could 

have   gone   down   foul   under   Mr.    B 's 

piercing  eye.  It  was  good  for  one  to  be 
sure  of  that  when,  in  an  open  roadstead,  one 
heard  in  the  cabin  the  wind  pipe  up;  but 
still   there  were   moments  when  I  detested 

Mr.  B exceedingly.     From  the  way  he 

used  to  glare  sometimes,  I  fancy  that  more 
than  once  he  paid  me  back  with  interest. 
It  so  happened  that  we  both  loved  the  little 
bark  very  much.  And  it  was  just  the  de- 
fect of  Mr.  B 's  inestimable  qualities  that 

he  would  never  persuade  himself  to  believe 
that  the  ship  was  safe  in  my  hands.  To  be- 
gin with,  he  was  more  than  five  years  older 
than  myself  at  a  time  of  life  when  five  years 
really  do  count,  I  being  twenty-nine  and  he 
thirty-four ;  then,  on  our  first  leaving  port  (I 
don't  see  why  I  should  make  a  secret  of  the 
fact  that  it  was  Bangkok),  a  bit  of  manoeu- 
vring of  mine  among  the  islands  of  the  Gulf 
28 


Emblems  of  Hope 

of  Siam  had  given  him  an  unforgettable  scare. 
Ever  since  then  he  had  nursed  in  secret  a 
bitter  idea  of  my  utter  recklessness.  But  upon 
the  whole,  and  unless  the  grip  of  a  man's  hand 
at  parting  means  nothing  whatever,  I  con- 
clude that  we  did  like  each  other  at  the  end 
of  two  years  and  three  months  well  enough. 
The  bond  between  us  was  the  ship;  and 
therein  a  ship,  though  she  has  female  at- 
tributes and  is  loved  very  unreasonably,  is 
different  from  a  woman.  That  I  should 
have  been  tremendously  smitten  with  my 
first  command  is  nothing  to  wonder  at,  but 

I  suppose  I  must  admit  that  Mr.  B 's 

sentiment  was  of  a  higher  order.  Each  of 
us,  of  course,  was  extremely  anxious  about 
the  good  appearance  of  the  beloved  object; 
and,  though  I  was  the  one  to  glean  compli- 
ments ashore,  B had  the  more  intimate 

pride  of  feeling,  resembling  that  of  a  devoted 
handmaiden.  And  that  sort  of  faithful  and 
proud  devotion  went  so  far  as  to  make  him 
go  about  flicking  the  dust  off  the  varnished 
teak-wood  rail  of  the  little  craft  with  a  silk 
pocket-handkerchief — a  present  from  Mrs. 
B— — ,  I  believe. 

29 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

That  was  the  effect  of  his  love  for  the 
bark.  The  effect  of  his  admirable  lack  of 
the  sense  of  security  once  went  so  far  as  to 
make  him  remark  to  me:  "Well,  sir,  you  are 
a  lucky  man!" 

It  was  said  in  a  tone  full  of  significance, 
but  not  exactly  offensive,  and  it  was,  I  sup- 
pose, my  innate  tact  that  prevented  my  ask- 
ing, "  What  on  earth  do  you  mean  by  that?" 

Later  on  his  meaning  was  illustrated  more 
fully  on  a  dark  night  in  a  tight  corner  dur- 
ing a  dead  on-shore  gale.  I  had  called  him 
up  on  deck  to  help  me  consider  our  ex- 
tremely unpleasant  situation.  There  was 
not  much  time  for  deep  thinking,  and  his 
summing  up  was:  "It  looks  pretty  bad, 
whichever  we  try ;  but  then,  sir,  you  always 
do  get  out  of  a  mess  somehow." 


It  is  difficult  to  disconnect  the  idea  of 
ships'  anchors  from  the  idea  of  the  ship's 
chief  mate — the  man  who  sees  them  go 
down  clear  and  come  up  sometimes  foul ;  be- 
cause not  even  the  most  unremitting  care 
30 


Emblems  of  Hope 

can  always  prevent  a  ship,  swinging  to 
winds  and  tide,  from  taking  an  awkward 
turn  of  the  cable  round  stock  or  fluke. 
Then  the  business  of  "getting  the  anchor' ' 
and  securing  it  afterwards  is  unduly  pro- 
longed, and  made  a  weariness  to  the  chief 
mate.  He  is  the  man  who  watches  the 
growth  of  the  cable — a  sailor's  phrase  which 
has  all  the  force,  precision,  and  imagery  of 
technical  language  that,  created  by  simple 
men  with  keen  eyes  for  the  real  aspect  of 
the  things  they  see  in  their  trade,  achieves 
the  just  expression  seizing  upon  the  essential, 
which  is  the  ambition  of  the  artist  in  words. 
Therefore  the  sailor  will  never  say  "cast 
anchor/ '  and  the  ship-master  aft  will  hail 
his  chief  mate  on  the  forecastle  in  impres- 
sionistic phrase:  "How  does  the  cable 
grow?"  Because  "grow"  is  the  right  word 
for  the  long  drift  of  a  cable  emerging  aslant 
under  the  strain,  taut  as  a  bow-string  above 
the  water.  And  it  is  the  voice  of  the  keep- 
er of  the  ship's  anchors  that  will  answer: 
"Grows  right  ahead,  sir,"  or  "Broad  on  the 
bow,"  or  whatever  concise  and  deferential 
shout  will  fit  the  case. 
3i 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

There  is  no  order  more  noisily  given  or 
taken  up  with  lustier  shouts  on  board  a 
homeward-bound  merchant  ship  than  the 
command,  "Man  the  windlass!"  The  rush 
of  expectant  men  out  of  the  forecastle,  the 
snatching  of  hand-spikes,  the  tramp  of  feet, 
the  clink  of  the  pawls,  make  a  stirring  ac- 
companiment to  a  plaintive  up-anchor  song 
with  a  roaring  chorus;  and  this  burst  of 
noisy  activity  from  a  whole  ship's  crew 
seems  like  a  voiceful  awakening  of  the  ship 
herself,  till  then,  in  the  picturesque  phrase 
of  Dutch  seamen,  "lying  asleep  upon  her 
iron." 

For  a  ship  with  her  sails  furled  on  her 
squared  yards,  and  reflected  from  truck  to 
water-line  in  the  smooth  gleaming  sheet  of  a 
landlocked  harbor,  seems,  indeed,  to  a  sea- 
man's eye  the  most  perfect  picture  of  slum- 
bering repose.  The  getting  of  your  anchor 
was  a  noisy  operation  on  board  a  merchant 
ship  of  yesterday  —  an  inspiring,  joyous 
noise,  as  if,  with  the  emblem  of  hope,  the 
ship's  company  expected  to  drag  up  out  of 
the  depths,  each  man  all  his  personal  hopes 
into  the  reach  of  a  securing  hand — the  hope 
32 


Emblems  of  Hope 

of  home,  the  hope  of  rest,  of  liberty,  of  dis- 
sipation, of  hard  pleasure,  following  the 
hard  endurance  of  many  days  between  sky 
and  water.  And  this  noisiness,  this  exulta- 
tion at  the  moment  of  the  ship's  departure, 
make  a  tremendous  contrast  to  the  silent 
moments  of  her  arrival  in  a  foreign  road- 
stead— the  silent  moments  when,  stripped 
of  her  sails,  she  forges  ahead  to  her  chosen 
berth,  the  loose  canvas  fluttering  softly  in 
the  gear  above  the  heads  of  the  men  stand- 
ing still  upon  her  decks,  the  master  gazing 
intently  forward  from  the  break  of  the  poop. 
Gradually  she  loses  her  way,  hardly  moving, 
with  the  three  figures  on  her  forecastle  wait- 
ing attentively  about  the  cat-head  for  the 
last  order  of,  perhaps,  full  ninety  days  at 
sea:  "Let  go!" 

This  is  the  final  word  of  a  ship's  ended 
journey,  the  closing  word  of  her  toil  and  of 
her  achievement.  In  a  life  whose  worth  is 
told  out  in  passages  from  port  to  port,  the 
splash  of  the  anchor's  fall  and  the  thunder- 
ous rumbling  of  the  chain  are  like  the  closing 
of  a  distinct  period,  of  which  she  seems  con- 
scious with  a  slight  deep  shudder  of  all  her 
33 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

frame.  By  so  much  is  she  nearer  to  her  ap- 
pointed death,  for  neither  years  nor  voyages 
can  go  on  forever.  It  is  to  her  like  the 
striking  of  a  clock,  and  in  the  pause  which 
follows  she  seems  to  take  count  of  the  pass- 
ing time. 

This  is  the  last  important  order ;  the  others 
are  mere  routine  directions.  Once  more  the 
master  is  heard:  "Give  her  forty-five  fathom 
to  the  water's  edge,"  and  then  he,  too,  is 
done  for  a  time.  For  days  he  leaves  all  the 
harbor  work  to  his  chief  mate,  the  keeper  of 
the  ship's  anchor  and  of  the  ship's  routine. 
For  days  his  voice  will  not  be  heard  raised 
about  the  decks,  with  that  curt,  austere  ac- 
cent of  the  man  in  charge,  till,  again,  when 
the  hatches  are  on,  and  in  a  silent  and  ex- 
pectant ship,  he  shall  speak  up  from  aft  in 
commanding  tones:  "Man  the  windlass!" 


The    Fine   Art 


[HE  other  year,  looking  through 
a  newspaper  of  sound  princi- 
ples, but  whose  staff  will  per- 
sist in  "casting"  anchors  and 
going  to  sea  "on"  a  ship 
(ough!),  I  came  across  an  article  upon  the 
season's  yachting.  And,  behold!  it  was  a 
good  article.  To  a  man  who  had  but  little 
to  do  with  pleasure  sailing  (though  all  sail- 
ing is  a  pleasure),  and  certainly  nothing 
whatever  with  racing  in  open  waters,  the 
writer's  strictures  upon  the  handicapping  of 
yachts  were  just  intelligible  and  no  more. 
And  I  do  not  pretend  to  any  interest  in  the 
enumeration  of  the  great  races  of  that  year. 
As  to  the  fifty- two-foot  linear  raters,  praised 
so  much  by  the  writer,  I  am  warmed  up  by 
his  approval  of  their  performances;  but,  as 
far  as  any  clear  conception  goes,  the  de- 
35 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

scriptive  phrase,  so  precise  to  the  compre- 
hension of  a  yachtsman,  evokes  no  definite 
image  in  my  mind. 

The  writer  praises  that  class  of  pleasure- 
vessels,  and  I  am  willing  to  indorse  his 
words,  as  any  man  who  loves  every  craft 
afloat  would  be  ready  to  do.  I  am  disposed 
to  admire  and  respect  the  fifty-two-foot 
linear  raters  on  the  word  of  a  man  who 
regrets  in  such  a  sympathetic  and  under- 
standing spirit  the  threatened  decay  of 
yachting  seamanship. 

Of  course,  yacht -racing  is  an  organized 
pastime,  a  function  of  social  idleness  min- 
istering to  the  vanity  of  certain  wealthy  in- 
habitants of  these  isles  nearly  as  much  as  to 
their  inborn  love  of  the  sea.  But  the  writer 
of  the  article  in  question  goes  on  to  point  out, 
with  insight  and  justice,  that  for  a  great  num- 
ber of  people  (twenty  thousand,  I  think  he 
says)  it  is  a  means  of  livelihood — that  it  is, 
in  his  own  words,  an  industry.  Now,  thS 
moral  side  of  an  industry,  productive  or  un- 
productive, the  redeeming  and  ideal  aspect 
of  this  bread-winning,  is  the  attainment  and 
preservation  of  the  highest  possible  skill  on 
36 


The  Fine  Art 

\  the  part  of  the  craftsmen.  Such  skill,  the 
skill  of  technique,  is  more  than  honesty;  it 
is  something  wider,  embracing  honesty  and 
grace  and  rule  in  an  elevated  and  clear  senti- 
ment, not  altogether  utilitarian,  which  may 
be  called  the  honor  of  labor.  It  is  made  up 
of  accumulated  tradition,  kept  alive  by  in- 
dividual pride,  rendered  exact  by  profes- 
sional opinion,  and,  like  the  higher  arts,  it 
is  spurred  on  and  sustained  by  discriminat- 
ing praise. 

This  is  why  the  attainment  of  proficiency, 
the  pushing  of  your  skill  with  attention  to 
the  most  delicate  shades  of  excellence,  is  a 
matter  of  vital  concern.  Efficiency  of  a 
practically  flawless  kind  may  be  reached 
naturally  in  the  struggle  for  bread.  But 
there  is  something  beyond — a  higher  point, 
a  subtle  and  unmistakable  touch  of  love  and 
pride  beyond  mere  skill;  almost  an  inspira- 
tion which  gives  to  all  work  that  finish 
which  is  almost  art — which  is  art. 

As  men  of  scrupulous  honor  set  up  a  high 

standard    of    public    conscience    above    the 

dead-level  of  an  honest  community,  so  men 

of  that  skill  which  passes  into  art  by  cease- 

37 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

less  striving  raise  the  dead-level  of  correct 
practice  in  the  crafts  of  land  and  sea.  The 
conditions  fostering  ,the  growth  of  that  su- 
preme, alive,  excellence,  as  well  in  work  as 
in  play,  ought  to  be  preserved  with  a  most 
careful  regard  lest  the  industry  or  the  game 
should  perish  of  an  insidious  and  inward  de- 
cay. Therefore  I  have  read  with  profound 
regret,  in  that  article  upon  the  yachting  sea- 
son of  a  certain  year,  that  the  seamanship 
on  board  racing-yachts  is  not  now  what  it 
used  to  be  only  a  few,  very  few,  years  ago. 

For  that  was  the  gist  of  that  article, 
written  evidently  by  a  man  who  not  only 
knows  but  understands — a  thing  (let  me  re- 
mark in  passing)  much  rarer  than  one  would 
expect,  because  the  sort  of  understanding  I 
mean  depends  so  much  on  love;  and  love, 
though  in  a  sense  it  may  be  admitted  to  be 
stronger  than  death,  is  by  no  means  so  uni- 
versal and  so  sure.  In  fact,  love  is  rare — 
the  love  of  men,  of  things,  of  ideas,  the  love 
of  perfected  skill.  For  love  is  the  enemy  of 
haste;  it  takes  count  of. passing  days,  of  men 
who  pass  away,  of  a  fine  art  matured  slowly 
in  the  course  of  years  and  doomed  in  a  short 
28 


The   Fine  Art 

time  to  pass  away,  too,  and  be  no  more. 
Love  and  regret  go  hand  in  hand  in  this 
world  of  changes  swifter  than  the  shifting  of 
the  clouds  reflected  in  the  mirror  of  the  sea. 

To  penalize  a  yacht  in  proportion  to  the 
fineness  of  her  performance  is  unfair  to  the 
craft  and  to  her  men.  It  is  unfair  to  the 
perfection  of  her  form  and  to  the  skill  of  her 
servants.  For  we  men  are,  in  fact,  the  ser- 
vants of  our  creations.  We  remain  in  ever- 
lasting bondage  to  the  productions  of  our 
brain  and  to  the  work  of  our  hands.  A  man 
is  born  to  serve  his  time  on  this  earth,  and 
there  is  something  fine  in  the  service  being 
given  on  other  grounds  than  that  of  utility. 
The  bondage  of  art  is  very  exacting.  And, 
as  the  writer  of  the  article  which  started  this 
train  of  thought  says  with  lovable  warmth, 
the  sailing  of  yachts  is  a  fine  art. 

His  contention  is  that  racing,  without 
time  allowances  for  anything  else  but  ton- 
nage— that  is,  for  size — has  fostered  the  fine 
art  of  sailing  to  the  pitch  of  perfection. 
Every  sort  of  demand  is  made  upon  the 
master  of  a  sailing-yacht,  and  to  be  penalized 
in  proportion  to  your  success  may  be  of 
39 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

advantage  to  the  sport  itself,  but  it  has  an 
obviously  deteriorating  effect  upon  the  sea- 
manship.    The  fine  art  is  being  lost. 


The  sailing  and  racing  of  yachts  has  de- 
veloped a  class  of  fore-and-aft  sailors,  men 
born  and  bred  to  the  sea,  fishing  in  winter 
and  yachting  in  summer;  men  to  whom  the 
handling  of  that  particular  rig  presents  no 
mystery.  It  is  their  striving  for  victory 
that  has  elevated  the  sailing  of  pleasure- 
craft  to  the  dignity  of  a  fine  art  in  that 
special*  sense.  As  I  have  said,  I  know  noth- 
ing of  racing  and  but  little  of  fore-and-aft 
rig;  but  the  advantages  of  such  a  rig  are 
obvious,  especially  for  purposes  of  pleasure, 
whether  in  cruising  or  racing.  It  requires 
less  effort  in  handling;  the  trimming  of  the 
sail-planes  to  the  wind  can  be  done  with 
speed  and  accuracy;  the  unbroken  spread  of 
the  sail -area  is  of  infinite  advantage;  and 
the  greatest  possible  amount  of  canvas  can 
be  displayed  upon  the  least  possible  quan- 
tity of  spars.  Lightness  and  concentrated 
40 


The   Fine  Art 

power  are  the  great  qualities  of  fore-and- 
aft  rig. 

A  fleet  of  fore-and-afters  at  anchor  has  its 
own  slender  graciousness.  The  setting  of 
their  sails  resembles  more  than  anything  else 
the  unfolding  of  a  bird's  wings;  the  facility 
of  their  evolutions  is  a  pleasure  to  the  eye. 
They  are  birds  of  the  sea,  whose  swimming 
is  like  flying,  and  resembles  more  a  natural 
function  than  the  handling  of  man-invented 
appliances.  The  fore-and-aft  rig  in  its  sim- 
plicity and  the  beauty  of  its  aspect  under 
every  angle  of  vision  is,  I  believe,  unap- 
proachable. A  schooner,  yawl,  or  cutter  in 
charge  of  a  capable  man  seems  to  handle 
herself  as  if  endowed  with  the  power  of  rea- 
soning and  the  gift  of  swift  execution.  One 
laughs  with  sheer  pleasure  at  a  smart  piece 
of  manoeuvring,  as  at  a  manifestation  of 
a  living  creature's  quick  wit  and  graceful 
precision. 

Of  those  three  varieties  of  fore-and-aft  rig, 
the  cutter — the  racing  rig  par  excellence — is  of 
an  appearance  the  most  imposing,  from  the 
fact  that  practically  all  her  canvas  is  in  one 
piece.  The  enormous  mainsail  of  a  cutter, 
41 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

as  she  draws  slowly  past  a  point  of  land  or 
the  end  of  a  jetty  under  your  admiring  gaze, 
invests  her  with  an  air  of  lofty  and  silent 
majesty.  At  anchor  a  schooner  looks  bet- 
ter; she  has  an  aspect  of  greater  efficiency 
and  a  better  balance  to  the  eye,  with  her 
two  masts  distributed  over  the  hull  with  a 
swaggering  rake  aft.  The  yawl  rig  one 
comes  in  time  to  love.  It  is,  I  should  think, 
the  easiest  of  all  to  manage. 

For  racing,  a  cutter;  for  a  long  pleasure 
voyage,  a  schooner;  for  cruising  in  home 
waters,  the  yawl;  and  the  handling  of  them 
all  is  indeed  a  fine  art.  It  requires  not  only 
the  knowledge  of  the  general  principles  of 
sailing,  but  a  particular  acquaintance  with 
the  character  of  the  craft.  All  vessels  are 
handled  in  the  same  way  as  far  as  theory 
goes,  just  as  you  may  deal  with  all  men  on 
broad  and  rigid  principles.  But  if  you 
want  that  success  in  life  which  comes  from 
the  affection  and  confidence  of  your  fellows, 
then  with  no  two  men,  however  similar  they 
may  appear  in  their  nature,  will  you  deal  in 
the  same  way.  There  may  be  a  rule  of  con- 
duct; there  is  no  rule  of  human  fellowship. 
42 


The  Fine  Art 

To  deal  with  men  is  as  fine  an  art  as  it  is  to  deal 
with  ships.  Both  men  and  ships  live  in  an  un- 
stable element,  are  subject  to  subtle  and  pow- 
erful influences,  and  want  to  have  their  merits 
understood  rather  than  their  faults  found  out. 

It  is  not  what  your  ship  will  not  do  that 
you  want  to  know  to  get  on  terms  of  suc- 
cessful partnership  with  her;  it  is,  rather, 
that  you  ought  to  have  a  precise  knowledge 
of  what  she  will  do  for  you  when  called  upon 
to  put  forth  what  is  in  her  by  a  sympathetic 
touch.  At  first  sight  the  difference  does  not 
seem  great  in  either  line  of  dealing  with  the 
difficult  problem  of  limitations.  But  the 
difference  is  great.  The  difference  lies  in 
the  spirit  in  which  the  problem  is  approach- 
ed. After  all,  the  art  of  handling  ships  is 
finer,  perhaps,  than  the  art  of  handling  men. 

And,  like  all  fine  arts,  it  must  be  based 
upon  a  broad,  solid  sincerity,  which,  like  a 
law  of  nature,  rules  an  infinity  of  different 
phenomena.  Your  endeavor  must  be  single- 
minded.  You  would  talk  differently  to  a 
coal-heaver  and  to  a  professor.  But  is  this 
duplicity?  I  deny  it.  The  truth  consists 
in  the  genuineness  of  the  feeling,  in  the 
4  '      43 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

genuine  recognition  of  the  two  men,  so 
similar  and  so  different,  as  your  two  partners 
in  the  hazard  of  life.  Obviously,  a.  humbug, 
thinking  only  of  winning  his  little  race, 
would  stand  a  chance  of  profiting  by  his 
artifices.  Men,  professors  or  coal-heavers, 
are  easily  deceived ;  they  even  have  an  ex- 
traordinary knack  of  lending  themselves  to 
deception,  a  sort  of  curious  and  inexplicable 
propensity  to  allow  themselves  to  be  led  by 
the  nose  with  their  eyes  open.  But  a  ship  is 
a  creature  which  we  have  brought  into  the 
world,  as  it  were,  on  purpose  to  keep  us  up 
to  the  mark.  In  her  handling,  a  ship  will 
not  put  up  with  a  mere  pretender,  as,  for  in- 
stance, the  public  will  do  with  Mr.  X,  the 
popular  statesman ;  Mr.  Y,  the  popular  scien- 
tist, or  Mr.  Z,  the  popular — what  shall  we 
say  ?  —  anything  from  a  teacher  of  high 
morality  to  a  bagman — who  have  won  their 
little  race.  But  I  would  like  (though  not 
accustomed  to  betting)  to  wager  a  large  sum 
that  not  one  of  the  few  first-rate  skippers  of 
racing-yachts  has  ever  been  a  humbug.  It 
would  have  been  too  difficult.  The  diffi- 
culty arises  from  the  fact  that  one  does  not 
44 


The  Fine  Art 

deal  with  ships  in  a  mob,  but  with  a  ship  as 
an  individual.  So  we  may  have  to  do  with 
men.  But  in  each  of  us  there  lurks  some 
particle  of  the  mob  spirit,  of  the  mob  tem- 
perament. No  matter  how  earnestly  we 
strive  against  each  other,  we  remain  brothers 
on  the  lowest  side  of  our  intellect  and  in  the 
instability  of  our  feelings.  With  ships  it  is 
not  so.  Much  as  they  are  to  us,  they  are 
nothing  to  each  other.  Those  sensitive 
creatures  have  no  ears  for  our  blandish- 
ments. It  takes  something  more  than  words 
to  cajole  them  to  do  our  will,  to  cover  us 
with  glory.  Luckily,  too,  or  else  there 
would  have  been  more  shoddy  reputations 
for  first  -  rate  seamanship.  Ships  have  no 
ears,  I  repeat,  though,  indeed,  I  think  I  have 
known  ships  who  really  seemed  to  have  had 
eyes,  or  else  I  cannot  understand  on  what 
ground  a  certain  one- thousand-ton  bark  of 
my  acquaintance  on  one  particular  occasion 
refused  to  answer  her  helm,  thereby  saving 
a  frightful  smash  to  two  ships  and  to  a  very 
good  man's  reputation.  I  knew  her  inti- 
mately for  two  years,  and  in  no  other  in- 
stance either  before  or  since  have  I  known 
45 


The  Mirror  of,  the  Sea 

her  to  do  that  thing.  The  man  she*  had 
served  so  well  (guessing,  perhaps,  at  the 
depths  of  his  affection  for  her),  I  have 
known  much  longer,  and  in  bare  justice  to 
him  I  must  say  that  this  confidence-shatter- 
ing experience  (though  so  fortunate)  only 
augmented  his  trust  in  her.  Yes,  our  ships 
have  no  ears,  and  thus  they  cannot  be  de- 
ceived. I  would  illustrate  my  idea  of 
fidelity  as  between  man  and  ship,  between 
the  master  and  his  art,  by  a  statement 
which,  though  it  might  appear  shockingly 
sophisticated,  is  really  very  simple.  I  would 
say  that  a  racing-yacht  skipper  who  thought 
of  nothing  else  but  the  glory  of  winning  the 
race  would  never  attain  to  any  eminence  of 
reputation.  The  genuine  masters  of  their 
craft — I  say  this  confidently  from  my  ex- 
perience of  ships — have  thought  of  nothing 
but  of  doing  their  very  best  by  the  vessel 
under  their  charge.  To  forget  one's  self,  to 
surrender  all  personal  feeling  in  the  service  of 
that  fine  art,  is  the  only  way  for  a  seaman  to 
accomplish  the  faithful  discharge  of  his  trust. 
Such  is  the  service  of  a  fine  art  and  of 
ships  that  sail  the  sea.  Arid  therein  I 
46 


The  Fine  Art 

think  I  can  lay  my  finger  upon  the  differ- 
ence between  the  seamen  of  yesterday,  who 
are  still  with  us,   and  the   seamen  of  to- 
morrow, already  entered  upon  the  posses- 
sion of  their  inheritance.     History  repeats 
itself,  but  the  special  call  of  an  art  which 
has  passed  away  is  never  reproduced.     It  is 
as  utterly  gone  out  of  the  world  as  the  song 
of    a    destroyed   wild    bird.     Nothing    will 
awaken  the   same   response   of  pleasurable 
emotion    or    conscientious    endeavor.     And 
the  sailing  of  any  vessel  afloat  is  an  art 
whose    fine    form   seems    already    receding 
from  us  on  its  way  to  the  overshadowed 
Valley  of  Oblivion.     The  taking  of  a  mod- 
ern steamship  about  the  world  (though  one 
would  not  minimize  its  responsibilities)  has 
not    the    same    quality    of    intimacy    with 
nature,  which,  after  all,  is  an  indispensable 
condition  to  the  building  up  of  an  art.     It 
is  less  personal  and  a  more  exact  calling; 
less  arduous,  but  also  less  gratifying  in  the 
lack  of  close  communion  between  the  artist 
and  the  medium  of  his  art.     It  is,  in  short, 
less  a  matter  of  love.     Its  effects  are  meas- 
ured exactly  in  time  and  space  as  no  effect 
47 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

of  ail  art  can  be.  It  is  an  occupation  which 
a  man  not  desperately  subject  to  sea-sickness 
can  be  imagined  to  follow  with  content, 
without  enthusiasm,  with  industry,  without 
affection.  Punctuality  is  its  watchword. 
The  incertitude  which  attends  closely  every 
artistic  endeavor  is  absent  from  its  regulated 
enterprise.  It  has  no  great  moments  of  self- 
confidence,  or  moments  not  less  great  of 
doubt  and  heart  -  searching.  It  is  an  in- 
dustry which,  like  other  industries,  has  its 
romance,  its  honor,  and  its  rewards,  its  bitter 
anxieties  and  its  hours  of  ease.  But  such 
sea-going  has  not  the  artistic  quality  of  a 
single-handed  struggle  with  something  much 
greater  than  yourself;  it  is  not  the  laborious, 
absorbing  practice  of  an  art  whose  ultimate 
result  remains  on  the  knees  of  the  gods.  It 
is  not  an  individual,  temperamental  achieve- 
ment, but  simply  the  skilled  use  of  a  capt- 
ured force,  merely  another  step  forward  upon 
the  way  of  universal  conquest. 


Every  passage   of   a   ship   of  yesterday, 
whose  yards  were  braced  round  eagerly  the 
48 


The  Fine  Art 

very  moment  the  pilot,  with  his  pockets  full 
of  letters,  had  got  over  the  side,  was  like  a 
race — a  race  against  time,  against  an  ideal 
standard  of  achievement  outstripping  the 
expectations  of  common  men.  Like  all  true 
art,  the  general  conduct  of  a  ship  and  her 
handling  in  particular  cases  had  a  technique 
which  could  be  discussed  with  delight  and 
pleasure  by  men  who  found  in  their  work 
not  bread  alone,  but  an  outlet  for  the  pecu- 
liarities of  their  temperament.  To  get  the 
best  and  truest  effect  from  the  infinitely 
varying  moods  of  sky  and  sea,  not  pictori- 
ally,  but  in  the  spirit  of  their  calling,  was 
their  vocation,  one  and  all;  and  they  recog- 
nized this  with  as  much  sincerity,  and  drew 
as  much  inspiration  from  this  reality,  as  any 
man  who  ever  put  brush  to  canvas.  The 
diversity  of  temperaments  was  immense 
among  those  masters  of  the  fine  art. 

Some  of  them  were  like  Royal  Academi- 
cians of  a  certain  kind.  They  never  startled 
you  by  a  touch  of  originality,  by  a  fresh 
audacity  of  inspiration.  They  were,  safe, 
very  safe.  They  went  about  solemnly  in 
the  assurance  of  their  consecrated  and 
49 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

empty  reputation.  Names  are  odious,  but 
I  remember  one  of  them  who  might  have 
been  their  very  president,  the  P.R.A.  of  the 
sea-craft.  His  weather-beaten  and  hand- 
some face,  his  portly  presence,  his  shirt- 
fronts  and  broad  cuffs  and  gold  links,  his 
air  of  bluff  distinction,  impressed  the  humble 
beholders  (stevedores,  tally  -  clerks,  tide- 
waiters)  as  he  walked  ashore  over  the  gang- 
way of  his  ship  lying  at  the  Circular  Quay  in 
Sydney.  His  voice  was  deep,  hearty,  and 
authoritative — the  voice  of  a  very  prince 
among  sailors.  He  did  everything  with  an 
air  which  put  your  attention  on  the  alert 
and  raised  your  expectations,  but  the  result 
somehow  was  always  on  stereotyped  lines, 
unsuggestive,  empty  of  any  lesson  that  one 
could  lay  to  heart.  He  kept  his  ship  in 
apple-pie  order,  which  would  have  been  sea- 
man-like enough  but  for  a  finicking  touch  in 
its  details.  His  officers  affected  a  superi- 
ority over  the  rest  of  us,  but  the  boredom  of 
their  souls  appeared  in  their  manner  of 
dreary  submission  to  the  fads  of  their  com- 
mander. It  was  only  his  apprenticed  boys 
whose  irrepressible  spirits  were  not  affected 
5° 


The  Fine  Art 

by  the  solemn  and  respectable  mediocrity  of 
that  artist.  There  were  four  of  these  young- 
sters: one  the  son  of  a  doctor,  another  of  a 
colonel,  the  third  of  a  jeweller;  the  name  of 
the  fourth  was  Twentyman,  and  this  is  all  I 
remember  of  his  parentage.  But  not  one  of 
them  seemed  to  possess  the  smallest  spark 
of  gratitude  in  his  composition.  Though 
their  commander  was  a  kind  man  in  his  way, 
and  had  made  a  point  of  introducing  them 
to  the  best  people  in  the  town  in  order  that 
they  should  not  fall  into  the  bad  company 
of  boys  belonging  to  other  ships,  I  regret  to 
say  that  they  made  faces  at  him  behind  his 
back,  and  imitated  the  dignified  carriage  of 
his  head  without  any  concealment  whatever. 
This  master  of  the  fine  art  was  a  person- 
age and  nothing  more;  but,  as  I  have  said, 
there  was  an  infinite  diversity  of  tempera- 
ment among  the  masters  of  the  fine  art  I 
have  known.  Some  were  great  impression- 
ists. They  impressed  upon  you  the  fear  of 
God  and  Immensity — or,  in  other  words,  the 
fear  of  being  drowned  with  every  circum- 
stance of  terrific  grandeur.  One  may  think 
that  the  locality  of  your  passing  away  by 
Si 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

means  of  suffocation  in  water  does  not  real- 
ly matter  very  much.  I  am  not  so  sure  of 
that.  I  am,  perhaps,  unduly  sensitive,  but 
I  confess  that  the  idea  of  being  suddenly 
spilled  into  an  infuriated  ocean  in  the  midst 
of  darkness  and  uproar  affected  me  always 
with  a  sensation  of  shrinking  distaste.  To 
be  drowned  in  a  pond,  though  it  might  be 
called  an  ignominious  fate  by  the  ignorant, 
is  yet  a  bright  and  peaceful  ending  in  com- 
parison with  some  other  endings  to  one's 
earthly  career  which  I  have  mentally  quaked 
at  in  the  intervals  or  even  in  the  midst  of 
violent  exertions. 

But  let  that  pass.  Some  of  the  masters 
whose  influence  left  a  trace  upon  my  char- 
acter to  this  very  day,  combined  a  fierceness 
of  conception  with  a  certitude  of  execution 
upon  the  basis  of  just  appreciation  of  means 
and  ends  which  is  the  highest  quality  of  the 
man  of  action.  And  an  artist  is  a  man  of 
action,  whether  he  creates  a  personality,  in- 
vents an  expedient,  or  finds  the  issue  of  a 
-complicated  situation. 

There  were  masters,  too,  I  have  known, 
whose  very  art  consisted  in  avoiding  every 
52 


The  Fine  Art 

conceivable  situation.  It  is  needless  to  say 
that  they  never  did  great  things  in  their 
craft;  but  they  were  not  to  be  despised  for 
that.  They  were  modest;  they  understood 
their  limitations.  Their  own  masters  had 
not  handed  the  sacred  fire  into  the  keeping 
of  their  cold  and  skilful  hands.  One  of 
those  last  I  remember  specially,  now  gone  to 
his  rest  from  that  sea  which  his  tempera- 
ment must  have  made  a  scene  of  little  more 
than  a  peaceful  pursuit.  Once  only  did  he 
attempt  a  stroke  of  audacity,  one  early 
morning,  with  a  steady  breeze,  entering  a 
crowded  roadstead.  But  he  was  not  genuine 
in  this  display  which  might  have  been  art. 
He  was  thinking  of  his  own  self ;  he  hankered 
after  the  meretricious  glory  of  a  showy  per- 
formance. 

As,  rounding  a  dark,  wooded  point, 
bathed  in  fresh  air  and  sunshine,  we  opened 
to  view  a  crowd  of  shipping  at  anchor  lying 
half  a  mile  ahead  of  us  perhaps,  he  called  me 
aft  from  my  station  on  the  forecastle  head, 
and,  turning  over  and  over  his  binoculars  in 
his  brown  hands,  said:  "  Do  you  see  that  big, 
heavy  ship  with  white  lower  masts?  I  am 
53 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

going  to  take  up  a  berth  between  her  and 
the  shore.  Now  do  you  see  to  it  that  the 
men  jump  smartly  at  the  first  order." 

I  answered  "Ay,  ay,  sir/'  and  verily  be- 
lieved that  this  would  be  a  fine  perform- 
ance. We  dashed  on  through  the  fleet  in 
magnificent  style.  There  must  have  been 
many  open  mouths  and  following  eyes  on 
board  those  ships — Dutch,  English,  with  a 
sprinkling  of  Americans  and  a  German  or 
two — who  had  all  hoisted  their  flags  at  eight 
o'clock  as  if  in  honor  of  our  arrival.  It 
would  have  been  a  fine  performance  if  it  had 
come  off,  but  it  did  not.  Through  a  touch 
of  self-seeking  that  modest  artist  of  solid 
merit  became  untrue  to  his  temperament. 
It  was  not  with  him  art  for  art's  sake:  it  was 
art  for  his  own  sake;  and  a  dismal  failure 
was  the  penalty  he  paid  for  that  greatest  of 
sins.  It  might  have  been  even  heavier,  but, 
as  it  happened,  we  did  not  run  our  ship 
ashore,  nor  did  we  knock  a  large  hole  in  the 
big  ship  whose  lower  masts  were  painted 
white.  But  it  is  a  wonder  that  we  did  not 
carry  away  the  cables  of  both  our  anchors, 
for,  as  may  be  imagined,  I  did  not  stand 
54 


The   Fine  Art 

upon  the  order  to  ''Let  go!"  that  came  to 
me  in  a  quavering,  quite  unknown  voice 
from  his  trembling  lips.  I  let  them  both  go 
with  a  celerity  which  to  this  day  astonishes 
my  memory.  No  average  merchantman's 
anchors  have  ever  been  let  go  with  such 
miraculous  smartness.  And  they  both  held. 
I  could  have  kissed  their  rough,  cold  iron 
palms  in  gratitude  if  they  had  not  been 
buried  in  slimy  mud  under  ten  fathoms  of 
water.  Ultimately  they  brought  us  up  with 
the  jib-boom  of  a  Dutch  brig  poking  through 
our  spanker — nothing  worse.  And  a  miss  is 
as  good  as  a  mile. 

But  not  in  art.  Afterwards  the  master 
said  to  me  in  a  shy  mumble,  "  She  wouldn't 
luff  up  in  time,  somehow.  What's  the  mat- 
ter with  her?"     And  I  made  no  answer. 

Yet  the  answer  was  clear.  The  ship  had 
found  out  the  momentary  weakness  of  her 
man.  Of  all  the  living  creatures  upon  land 
■and  sea,  it  is  ships  alone  that  cannot  be 
taken  in  by  barren  pretences,  that  will  not 
put  up  with  bad  art  from  their  masters. 


Cobwebs  and   Gossamer 


ROM  the  main  truck  of  the  av- 
erage tall  ship  the  horizon  de- 
scribes a  circle  of  many  miles, 
in  which  you  can  see  another 
ship  right  down  to  her  water- 
line;  and  these  very  eyes  which  follow  this 
writing  have  counted  in  their  time  over  a 
hundred  sail  becalmed,  as  if  within  a  magic 
ring,  not  very  far  from  the  Azores  —  ships 
more  or  less  tall.  There  were  hardly  two  of 
them  heading  exactly  the  same  way,  as  if 
each  had  meditated  breaking  out  of  the  en- 
chanted circle  at  a  different  point  of  the 
compass.  But  the  spell  of  the  calm  is  a 
strong  magic.  The  following  day  still  saw 
them  scattered  within  sight  of  one  another 
and  heading  different  ways;  but  when,  at 
last,  the  breeze  came  with  the  darkling  ripple 
that  ran  very  blue  on  a  pale  sea,  they  all 
56 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

went  in  the  same  direction  together.  For 
this  was  the  homeward-bound  fleet  from  the 
far-off  ends  of  the  earth,  and  a  Falmouth 
fruit-schooner,  the  smallest  of  them  all,  was 
heading  the  flight.  One  could  have  imag- 
ined her  very  fair,  if  not  divinely  tall,  leaving 
a  scent  of  lemons  and  oranges  in  her  wake. 

The  next  day  there  were  very  few  ships  in 
sight  from  our  mast-heads — seven  at  most, 
perhaps,  with  a  few  more  distant  specks,  hull 
down,  beyond  the  magic  ring  of  the  horizon. 
The  spell  of  the  fair  wind  has  a  subtle  power 
to  scatter  a  white-winged  company  of  ships 
looking  all  the  same  way,  each  with  its  white 
fillet  of  tumbling  foam  under  the  bow.  It  is 
the  calm  that  brings  ships  mysteriously  to- 
gether; it  is  your  wind  that  is  the  great 
separator. 

The  taller  the  ship,  the  farther  she  can  be 
seen;  and  her  white  tallness  breathed  upon 
by  the  wind  first  proclaims  her  size.  The 
tall  masts  holding  aloft  the  white  canvas, 
spread  out  like  a  snare  for  catching  the  in- 
visible power  of  the  air,  emerge  gradually 
from  the  water,  sail  after  sail,  yard  after 
yard,  growing  big,  till,  under  the  towering 
57 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

structure  of  her  machinery,  you  perceive  the 
insignificant,  tiny  speck  of  her  hull. 

The  tall  masts  are  the  pillars  supporting 
the  balanced  planes  that,  motionless  and 
silent,  catch  from  the  air  the  ship's  motive 
power,  as  it  were  a  gift  from  heaven  vouch- 
safed to  the  audacity  of  man;  and  it  is  the 
ship's  tall  spars,  stripped  and  shorn  of  their 
white  glory,  that  incline  themselves  before 
the  anger  of  the  clouded  heaven. 

When  they  yield  to  a  squall  in  a  gaunt  and 
naked  submission  their  tallness  is  brought 
best  home  even  to  the  mind  of  a  seaman.  The 
man  who  has  looked  upon  his  ship  going  over 
too  far  is  made  aware  of  the  preposterous  tall- 
ness of  a  ship's  spars.  It  seems  impossible 
but  that  those  gilt  trucks  which  one  had  to 
tilt  one's  head  back  to  see,  now  falling  into 
the  lower  plane  of  vision,  must  perforce  hit 
the  very  edge  of  the  horizon.  Such  an  ex- 
perience gives  you  a  better  impression  of  the 
loftiness  of  your  spars  than  any  amount  of 
running  aloft  could  do.  And  yet  in  my  time 
the  royal  yards  of  an  average  profitable  ship 
were  a  good  way  up  above  her  decks. 

No  doubt  a  fair  amount  of  climbing  up 
*8 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

iron  ladders  can  be  achieved  by  an  active 
man  in  a  ship's  engine-room,  but  I  remem- 
ber moments  when  even  to  my  supple  limbs 
and  pride  of  nimbleness  the  sailing-ship's  ma- 
chinery seemed  to  reach  up  to  the  very  stars. 
For  machinery  it  is,  doing  its  work  in 
perfect  silence  and  with  a  motionless  grace, 
that  seems  to  hide  a  capricious  and  not 
always  governable  power,  taking  nothing 
away  from  the  material  stores  of  the  earth. 
Not  for  it  the  unerring  precision  of  steel 
moved  by  white  steam  and  living  by  red  fire 
and  fed  with  black  coal.  The  other  seems  to 
draw  its  strength  from  the  very  soul  of  the 
world,  its  formidable  ally,  held  to  obedience 
by  the  frailest  bonds,  like  a  fierce  ghost  capt- 
ured in  a  snare  of  something  even  finer  than 
spun  silk.  For  what  is  the  array  of  the  strong- 
est ropes,  the  tallest  spars,  and  the  stoutest 
canvas  against  the  mighty  breath  of  the  infi- 
nite but  thistle  stalks,  cob  webs,  and  gossamer  ? 


Indeed,  it  is  less  than  nothing,  and  I  have 
seen,  when  the  great  soul  of  the  world  turned 
s  59 


The   Mirror  of  the  Sea 

over  with  a  heavy  sigh,  a  perfectly  new,  ex- 
tra stout  foresail  vanish  like  a  bit  of  some 
airy  stuff  much  lighter  than  gossamer. 
Then  was  the  time  for  the  tall  spars  to 
stand  fast  in  the  great  uproar.  The  ma- 
chinery must  do  its  work  even  if  the  soul  of 
the  world  has  gone  mad. 

The  modern  steamship  advances  upon  a 
still  and  overshadowed  sea  with  a  pulsating 
tremor  of  her  frame,  an  occasional  clang  in 
her  depths,  as  if  she  had  an  iron  heart  in 
her  iron  body;  with  a  thudding  rhythm  in 
her  progress  and  the  regular  beat  of  her  pro- 
peller, heard  afar  in  the  night  with  an 
august  and  plodding  sound  as  of  the  march 
of  an  inevitable  future.  But  in  a  gale,  the 
silent  machinery  of  a  sailing-ship  would 
catch  not  only  the  power,  but  the  wild  and 
exulting  voice  of  the  world's  soul.  Whether 
she  ran  with  her  tall  spars  swinging,  or 
breasted  it  with  her  tall  spars  lying  over, 
there  was  always  that  wild  song,  deep  like  a 
chant,  for  a  bass  to  the  shrill  pipe  of  the 
wind  played  on  the  sea-tops,  with  a  punctu- 
ating crash,  now  and  then,  of  a  breaking 
wave.  At  times  the  weird  effects  of  that 
60 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

invisible  orchestra  would  get  upon  a  man's 
nerves  till  he  wished  himself  deaf. 

And  this  recollection  of  a  personal  wish, 
experienced  upon  several  oceans,  where  the 
soul  of  the  world  has  plenty  of  room  to  turn 
over  with  a  mighty  sigh,  brings  me  to  the 
remark  that  in  order  to  take  a  proper  care 
of  a  ship's  spars  it  is  just  as  well  for  a  sea- 
man to  have  nothing  the  matter  with  his 
ears.  Such  is  the  intimacy  with  which  a 
seaman  had  to  live  with  his  ship  of  yester- 
day that  his  senses  were  like  her  senses,  that 
the  stress  upon  his  body  made  him  judge  of 
the  strain  upon  the  ship's  masts. 

I  had  been  some  time  at  sea  before  I  be- 
came aware  of  the  fact  that  hearing  plays  a 
perceptible  part  in  gauging  the  force  of  the 
wind.  It  was  at  night.  The  ship  was  one 
of  those  iron  wool-clippers  that  the  Clyde 
had  floated  out  in  swarms  upon  the  world 
during  the  seventh  decade  of  the  last  cen- 
tury. It  was  a  fine  period  in  ship-building, 
and  also,  I  might  say,  a  period  of  over- 
masting.  The  spars  rigged  up  on  the  nar- 
row hulls  were  indeed  tall  then,  and  the 
ship  of  which  I  think,  with  her  colored- 
61 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

glass  skylight  ends,  bearing  the  motto,  "Let 
Glasgow  Flourish,"  was  certainly  one  of  the 
most  heavily  sparred  specimens.  She  was 
built  for  hard  driving,  and  unquestionably 
she  got  all  the  driving  she  could  stand. 
Our  captain  was  a  man  famous  for  the 
quick  passages  he  had  been  used  to  make  in 
the  old  Tweed,  a  ship  famous  the  world  over 
for  her  speed.  The  Tweed  had  been  a 
wooden  vessel,  and  he  brought  the  tradition 
of  quick  passages  with  him  into  the  iron  clip- 
per. I  was  the  junior  in  her,  a  third  mate, 
keeping  watch  with  the  chief  officer;  and  it 
was  just  during  one  of  the  night-watches  in 
a  strong,  freshening  breeze  that  I  overheard 
two  men  in  a  sheltered  nook  of  the  main- 
deck  exchanging  these  informing  remarks. 
Said  one: 

"Should  think  'twas  time  some  of  them 
light  sails  were  coming  off  her." 

And  the  other,  an  older  man,  uttered 
grumpily : 

"No  fear!  not  while  the  chief  mate's  on 
deck.  He's  that  deaf  he  can't  tell  how 
much  wind  there  is." 

And,   indeed,   poor  P ,   quite  young, 

62 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

and  a  smart  seaman,  was  very  hard  of  hear- 
ing. At  the  same  time,  he  had  the  name  of 
being  the  very  devil  of  a  fellow  for  carrying 
on  sail  on  a  ship.  He  was  wonderfully 
clever  at  concealing  his  deafness,  and,  as  to 
carrying  on  heavily,  though  he  was  a  fear- 
less man,  I  don't  think  that  he  ever  meant 
to  take  undue  risks.  I  can  never  forget  his 
naive  sort  of.  astonishment  when  remon- 
strated with  for  what  appeared  a  most  dare- 
devil performance.  The  only  person,  of 
course,  that  could  remonstrate  with  telling 
effect  was  our  captain,  himself  a  man  of 
dare-devil  tradition;  and  really,  for  me,  who 
knew  under  whom  I  was  serving,  those  were 

impressive   scenes.     Captain   S had   a 

great  name  for  sailor-like  qualities — the  sort 
of  name  that  compelled  my  youthful  ad- 
miration. To  this  day  I  preserve  his  mem- 
ory, for,  indeed,  it  was  he  in  a  sense  who 
completed  my  training.  It  was  often  a 
stormy  process,  but  let  that  pass.  I  am 
sure  he  meant  well,  and  I  am  certain  that 
never,  not  even  at  the  time,  could  I  bear 
him  malice  for  his  extraordinary  gift  of  in- 
cisive criticism.  And  to  hear  him  make  a 
(>3 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

fuss  about  too  much  sail  on  the  ship  seemed 
one  of  those  incredible  experiences  that  take 
place  only  in  one's  dreams. 

It  generally  happened  in  this  way:  Night, 
clouds  racing  overhead,  wind  howling,  royals 
set,  and  the  ship  rushing  on  in  the  dark,  an 
immense  white  sheet  of  foam  level  with  the 

lee  rail.     Mr.  P ,  in  charge  of  the  deck, 

hooked  on  to  the  windward  mizzen-rigging 
in  a  state  of  perfect  serenity;  myself,  the 
third  mate,  also  hooked  on  somewhere  to 
windward  of  the  slanting  poop,  in  a  state  of 
the  utmost  preparedness  to  jump  at  the 
very  first  hint  of  some  sort  of  order,  but 
otherwise  in  a  perfectly  acquiescent  state 
of  mind.  Suddenly,  out  of  the  companion 
would  appear  a  tall,  dark  figure,  bareheaded, 
with  a  short,  white  beard  of  a  perpendicular 

cut,  very  visible  in  the  dark — Captain  S , 

disturbed  in  his  reading  down  below  by  the 
frightful  bounding  and  lurching  of  the  ship. 
Leaning  very  much  against  the  precipitous 
incline  of  the  deck,  he  would  take  a  turn  or 
two,  perfectly  silent,  hang  on  by  the  com- 
pass for  a  while,  take  another  couple  of 
turns,  and  suddenly  burst  out: 
64 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

"What  are  you  trying  to  do  with  the 
ship?" 

And  Mr.   P ,  who  was  not  good  at 

catching  what  was  shouted  in  the  wind, 
would  say,  interrogatively: 

"Yes,  sir?" 

Then  in  the  increasing  gale  of  the  sea 
there  would  be  a  little  private  ship's  storm 
going  on  in  which  you  could  detect  strong 
language,  pronounced  in  a  tone  of  passion 
and  exculpatory  protestations  uttered  with 
every  possible  inflection  of  injured  innocence. 

"By  Heavens,  Mr.  P !  I  used  to  carry 

on  sail  in  my  time,  but — " 

And  the  rest  would  be  lost  to  me  in  a 
stormy  gust  of  wind. 

Then,  in  a  lull,  P 's  protesting  inno- 
cence would  become  audible: 

"She  seems  to  stand  it  very  well/' 

And  then  another  burst  of  an  indignant, 
voice : 

"Any  fool  can  carry  sail  on  a  ship — " 

And  so  on,  and  so  on,  the  ship  meanwhile 

rushing  on  her  way  with  a  heavier  list,  a 

noisier  splutter,  a  more  threatening  hiss  of 

the  white,  almost  blinding,  sheet  of  foam  to 

65 


The  Mirror  of  the   Sea 

leeward.  For  the  best  of  it  was  that  Cap- 
tain S seemed  constitutionally  incapa- 
ble of  giving  his  officers  a  definite  order  to 
shorten  sail;  and  so  that  extraordinarily 
vague  row  would  go  on  till  at  last  it  dawned 
upon  them  both,  in  some  particularly  alarm- 
ing gust,  that  it  was  time  to  do  something. 
There  is  nothing  like  the  fearful  inclination 
of  your  tall  spars  overloaded  with  canvas  to 
bring  a  deaf  man  and  an  angry  one  to  their 
senses. 


So  sail  did  get  shortened  more  or  less  in 
time  even  in  that  ship,  and  her  tall  spars 
never  went  overboard  while  I  served  in  her. 
However,   all  the  time   I  was  with  them, 

Captain  S and  Mr.  P did  not  get 

on  very  well  together.     If  P carried  on 

"like  the  very  devil"  because  he  was  too 
deaf  to  know  how  much  wind  there  was, 

Captain  S (who,  as  I  have  said,  seemed 

constitutionally  incapable  of  ordering  one  of 
his    officers    to   shorten   sail)    resented   the 

necessity  forced  upon  him  by  Mr.  P 's 

00 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

desperate  goings  on.  It  was  in  Captain 
S 's  tradition  rather  to  reprove  his  offi- 
cers for  not  carrying  on  quite  enough — in  his 
phrase,  "for  not  taking  every  ounce  of  ad- 
vantage of  a  fair  wind."  But  there  was 
also  a  psychological  motive  that  made  him 
extremely  difficult  to  deal  with  on  board 
that  iron  clipper.  He  had  just  come  out  of 
the  marvellous'  Tweed,  a  ship,  I  have  heard, 
heavy  to  look  at  but  of  phenomenal  speed. 
In  the  middle  sixties  she  had  beaten  by  a 
day  and  a  half  the  steam  mail-boat  from 
Hong-Kong  to  Singapore.  There  was  some- 
thing peculiarly  lucky,  perhaps,  in  the 
placing  of  her  masts — who  knows  ?  Officers 
of  men-of-war  used  to  come  on  board  to 
take  the  exact  dimensions  of  her  sail-plan. 
Perhaps  there  had  been  a  touch  of  genius  or 
the  finger  of  good-fortune  in  the  fashioning 
of  her  lines  at  bow  and  stern.  It  is  impos- 
sible to  say.  She  was  built  in  the  East 
Indies  somewhere,  of  teak-wood  through- 
out, except  the  deck.  She  had  a  great 
sheer,  high  bows,  and  a  clumsy  stern.  The 
men  who  had  seen  her  described  her  to  me 
as  "nothing  much  to  look  at."  But  in  the 
67 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

great  Indian  famine  of  the  seventies  that 
ship,  already  old  then,  made  some  wonder- 
ful dashes  across  the  Gulf  of  Bengal  with 
cargoes  of  rice  from  Rangoon  to  Madras. 

She  took  the  secret  of  her  speed  with  her, 
and,  unsightly  as  she  was,  her  image  surely 
has  its  glorious  place  in  the  mirror  of  the  old 
sea. 

The  point,  however,  is  that  Captain  S , 

who  used  to  say,  frequently,  "She  never 
made  a  decent  passage  after  I  left  her," 
seemed  to  think  that  the  secret  of  her  speed 
lay  in  her  famous  commander.  No  doubt 
the  secret  of  many  a  ship's  excellence  does 
lie  with  the  man  on  board,  but  it  was  hope- 
less for  Captain  S to  try  to  make  his 

new  iron  clipper  equal  the  feats  which  made 
the  old  Tweed  a  name  of  praise  upon  the  lips 
of  English  -  speaking  seaman.  There  was 
something  pathetic  in  it,  as  in  the  endeavor 
of  an  artist  in  his  old  age  to  equal  the  master- 
pieces of  his  youth — for  the  Tweed's  famous 

passages  were  Captain  S 's  masterpieces. 

It  was  pathetic,  and  perhaps  just  the  least 
bit  dangerous.     At  any  rate,  I  am  glad  that, 

what  between  Captain  S 's  yearning  for 

68 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

old  triumphs  and  Mr.   P 's  deafness,   I 

have  seen  some  memorable  carrying  on  to 
make  a  passage.  And  I  have  carried  on 
myself  upon  the  tall  spars  of  that  Clyde 
ship -builder's  masterpiece  as  I  have  never 
carried  on  in  a  ship  before  or  since. 

The  second  mate  falling  ill  during  the 
passage,  I  was  promoted  to  officer  of  the 
watch,  alone  iri  charge  of  the  deck.  Thus 
the  immense  leverage  of  the  ship's  tall 
masts  became  a  matter  very  near  my  own 
heart.  I  suppose  it  was  something  of  a 
compliment  for  a  young  fellow  to  be  trust- 
ed, apparently  without  any  supervision,  by 

such  a  commander  as  Captain  S ;  though, 

as  far  as  I  can  remember,  neither  the  tone, 
nor  the  manner,  nor  yet  the  drift  of  Captain 

S 's   remarks   addressed   to   myself   did 

ever,  by  the  most  strained  interpretation, 
imply  a  favorable  opinion  of  my  abilities. 
And  he  was,  I  must  say,  a  most  uncomfort- 
able commander  to  get  your  orders  from  at 
night.  If  I  had  the  watch  from  eight  till 
midnight,  he  would  leave  the  deck  about 
nine  with  the  words,  "  Don't  take  any  sail 
off  her."  Then,  on  the  point  of  disappear- 
ed 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ing  down  the  companion-way,  he  would  add, 
curtly:  ''Don't  carry  anything  away."  I 
am  glad  to  say  that  I  never  did;  one  night, 
however,  I  was  caught  not  quite  prepared 
by  a  sudden  shift  of  wind. 

There  was,  of  course,  a  good  deal  of  noise 
— running  about,  the  shouts  of  the  sailors, 
the  thrashing  of  the  sails — enough,  in  fact, 

to  wake  the  dead.     But  S never  came 

on  deck.  When  I  was  relieved  by  the  chief 
mate  an  hour  afterwards,  he  sent  for  me.  I 
went  into  his  state-room;  he  was  lying  on 
his  couch  wrapped  up  in  a  rug,  with  a  pillow 
under  his  head. 

"  What  was  the  matter  with  you  up  there 
just  now?"  he  asked. 

"Wind  flew  round  on  the  lee  quarter,  sir," 
I  said. 

"Couldn't  you  see  the  shift  coming?" 

"Yes,  sir,  I  thought  it  wasn't  very  far 
off." 

"Why  didn't  you  have  your  courses  haul- 
ed up  at  once,  then?"  he  asked,  in  a  tone 
that  ought  to  have  made  my  blood  run  cold. 

But  this  was  my  chance,  and  I  did  not  let 
it  slip. 

70 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

"Well,  sir,"  I  said  in  an  apologetic  tone, 
"  she  was  going  eleven  knots  very  nicely,  and 
I  thought  she  would  do  for  another  half- 
hour  or  so." 

He  gazed  at  me  darkly  out  of  his  head, 
lying  very  still  on  the  white  pillow  for  a 
time. 

"Ah,  yes,  another  half -hour.  That's  the 
way  ships  get  dismasted." 

And  that  was  all  I  got  in  the  way  of  a 
wigging.  I  waited  a  little  while,  and  then 
went  out,  shutting  carefully  the  door  of  the 
state-room  after  me. 

Well,  I  have  loved,  lived  with,  and  left 
the  sea  without  ever  seeing  a  ship's  tall 
fabric  of  sticks,  cobwebs,  and  gossamer  go 
by  the  board.     Sheer  good  luck,  no  doubt. 

But  as  to  poor  P ,  I  am  sure  that  he 

wTould  not  have  got  off  scot-free  like  this 
but  for  the  god  of  gales,  who  called  him 
away  soon  from  this  earth,  which  is  three 
parts  ocean,  and  therefore  a  fit  abode  for 
sailors.  A  few  years  afterwards  I  met  in  an 
Indian  port  a  man  who  had  served  in  the 
ships  of  the  same  company.  Names  came 
up  in  our  talk,  names  of  our  colleagues  in 
7i 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

the  same  employ,  and,  naturally  enough,  I 
asked  after  P .  Had  he  got  a  com- 
mand yet?  And  the  other  man  answered, 
carelessly : 

"  No ;  but  he's  provided  for,  anyhow. 
A  heavy  sea  took  him  off  the  poop  in 
the  run  between  New  Zealand  and  the 
Horn." 

Thus  P passed  away  from  among  the 

tall  spars  of  ships  that  he  had  tried  to  their 
utmost  in  many  a  spell  of  boisterous  weather. 
He  had  shown  me  what  carrying  on  meant, 
but  he  was  not  a  man  to  learn  discretion 
from.  He  could  not  help  his  deafness.  One 
can  only  remember  his  cheery  temper,  his 
admiration  for  the  jokes  in  Punch,  his  little 
oddities — like  his  strange  passion  for  bor- 
rowing looking-glasses,  for  instance.  Each 
of  our  cabins  had  its  own  looking-glass 
screwed  to  the  bulkhead,  and  what  he 
wanted  with  more  of  them  we  never  could 
fathom.  He  asked  for  the  loan  in  confi- 
dential tones.  Why?  Mystery.  We  made 
various  surmises.  No  one  will  ever  know 
now.  At  any  rate,  it  was  a  harmless  eccen- 
tricity, and  may  the  god  of  gales,  who  took 
72 


Cobwebs  and  Gossamer 

him  away  so  abruptly  between  New  Zealand 
and  the  Horn,  let  his  soul  rest  in  some  para- 
dise of  true  seamen,  where  no  amount  of 
carrying  on  will  ever  dismast  a  ship. 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 


[HERE  has  been  a  time  when  a 
ship's  chief  mate,  pocket-book 
in  hand  and  pencil  behind  his 
ear,  kept  one  eye  aloft  upon  his 
riggers  and  the  other  down  the 
hatchway  on  the  stevedores,  and  watched 
the  disposition  of  his  ship's  cargo,  knowing 
that  even  before  she  started  he  was  already 
doing  his  best  to  secure  for  her  an  easy  and 
quick  passage. 

The  hurry  of  the  times,  the  loading  and 
discharging  organization  of  the  docks,  the 
use  of  hoisting  machinery  which  works 
quickly  and  will  not  wait,  the  cry  for  prompt 
despatch,  the  very  size  of  his  ship,  stand 
nowadays  between  the  modern  seaman  and 
the  thorough  knowledge  of  his  craft. 

There  are  profitable  ships  and  unprofit- 
able ships.     The  profitable  ship  will  carry  a 
74 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

large  load  through  all  the  hazards  of  the 
weather,  and,  when  at  rest,  will  stand  up  in 
dock  and  shift  from  berth  to  berth  without 
ballast.  There  is  a  point  of  perfection  in 
a  ship  as  a  worker  when  she  is  spoken  of 
as  being  able  to  sail  without  ballast.  I 
have  never  met  that  sort  of  paragon  myself, 
but  I  have  seen  these  paragons  advertised 
among  ships  for  sale.  Such  excess  of  virtue 
and  good-nature  on  the  part  of  a  ship  always 
provoked  my  mistrust.  It  is  open  to  any 
man  to  say  that  his  ship  will  sail  without 
ballast;  and  he  will  say  it,  too,  with  every 
mark  of  profound  conviction,  especially  if  he 
is  not  going  to  sail  in  her  himself.  The  risk 
of  advertising  her  as  able  to  sail  without  bal- 
last is  not  great,  since  the  statement  does 
not  imply  a  warranty  of  her  arriving  any- 
where. Moreover,  it  is  strictly  true  that  most 
ships  will  sail  without  ballast  for  some  little 
time  before  they  turn  turtle  upon  the  crew. 
A  ship-owner  loves  a  profitable  ship;  the 
seaman  is  proud  of  her;  a  doubt  of  her  good 
looks  seldom  exists  in  his  mind;  but  if  he 
can  boast  of  her  more  useful  qualities  it  is 
an  added  satisfaction  for  his  self-love. 
6  75 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

The  loading  of  ships  was  once  a  matter 
of  skill,  judgment,  and  knowledge.  Thick 
books  have  been  written  about  it.  Stevens 
on  Stowage  is  a  portly  volume  with  the  re- 
nown and  weight  (in  its  own  world)  of  Coke 
on  Littleton.  Stevens  is  an  agreeable  writer, 
and,  as  is  the  case  with  men  of  talent,  his 
gifts  adorn  his  sterling  soundness.  He  gives 
you  the  official  teaching  on  the  whole  sub- 
ject, is  precise  as  to  rules,  mentions  illustra- 
tive events,  quotes  law  cases  where  verdicts 
turned  upon  a  point  of  stowage.  He  is 
never  pedantic,  and,  for  all  his  close  ad- 
herence to  broad  principles,  he  is  ready  to 
admit  that  no  two  ships  can  be  treated  ex- 
actly alike. 

Stevedoring,  which  had  been  a  skilled 
labor,  is  fast  becoming  a  labor  without  the 
skill.  The  modern  steamship  with  her  many 
holds  is  not  loaded  within  the  sailor-like 
meaning  of  the  word.  She  is  filled  up.  Her 
cargo  is  not  stowed  in  any  sense ;  it  is  simply 
dumped  into  her  through  six  hatchways, 
more  or  less,  by  twelve  winches  or  so,  with 
clatter  and  hurry  and  racket  and  heat,  in  a 
cloud  of  steam  and  a  mess  of  coal-dust.  As 
76 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

long  as  you  keep  her  propeller  under  water, 
and  take  care,  say,  not  to  fling  down  barrels 
of  oil  on  top  of  bales  of  silk,  or  deposit  an 
iron  bridge-girder  of  five  ton  or  so  upon  a 
bed  of  coffee-bags,  you  have  done  about  all 
in  the  way  of  duty  that  the  cry  for  prompt 
despatch  will  allow  you  to  do. 


The  sailing-ship,  when  I  knew  her  in  her 
days  of  perfection,  was  a  sensible  creature. 
When  I  say  her  days  of  perfection,  I  mean 
perfection  of  build,  gear,  seaworthy  qualities 
and  ease  of  handling,  not  the  perfection  of 
speed.  That  quality  has  departed  with  the 
change  of  building  material.  No  iron  ship 
of  yesterday  ever  attained  the  marvels  of 
speed  which  the  seamanship  of  men  famous 
in  their  time  had  obtained  from  their  wood- 
en, copper-sheeted  predecessors.  Everything 
had  been  done  to  make  the  iron  ship  per- 
fect, but  no  wit  of  man  had  managed  to  de- 
vise an  efficient  coating  composition  to  keep 
her  bottom  clean  with  the  smooth  cleanness 
of  yellow  metal-sheeting.  After  a  spell  of  a 
77 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

few  weeks  at  sea,  an  iron  ship  begins  to  lag 
as  if  she  had  grown  tired  too  soon.  It  is 
only  her  bottom  that  is  getting  foul.  A 
very  little  affects  the  speed  of  an  iron  ship 
which  is  not  driven  on  by  a  merciless  pro- 
peller. Often  it  is  impossible  to  tell  what 
inconsiderate  trifle  puts  her  off  her  stride. 
A  certain  mysteriousness  hangs  around  the 
quality  of  speed  as  it  was  displayed  by  the 
old  sailing-ships  commanded  by  a  competent 
seaman.  In  those  days  the  speed  depended 
upon  the  seaman;  therefore,  apart  from  the 
laws,  rules,  and  regulations  for  the  good 
preservation  of  his  cargo,  he  was  careful  of 
his  loading,  or  what  is  technically  called  the 
trim  of  his  ship.  Some  ships  sailed  fast  on 
an  even  keel,  others  had  to  be  trimmed 
quite  one  foot  by  the  stern,  and  I  have 
heard  of  a  ship  that  gave  her  best  speed  on  a 
wind  when  so  loaded  as  to  float  a  couple  of 
inches  by  the  head. 

I  call  to  mind  a  winter  landscape  in  Am- 
sterdam—  a  flat  foreground  of  waste -land, 
with  here  and  there  stacks  of  timber,  like 
the  huts  of  a  camp  of  some  very  miserable 
tribe;  the  long  stretch  of  the  Handelskade; 
78 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

cold,  stone  -  faced  quays,  with  the  snow- 
sprinkled  ground  and  the  hard,  frozen  water 
of  the  canal,  in  which  were  set  ships  one  be- 
hind another  with  their  frosty  mooring- 
ropes  hanging  slack  and  their  decks  idle  and 
deserted,  because,  as  the  master  stevedore  (a 
gentle,  pale  person,  with  a  few  golden  hairs 
on  his  chin  and  a  reddened  nose)  informed 
me,  their  cargoes  were  frozen  in  up-country 
on  barges  and  schuyts.  In  the  distance,  be- 
yond the  waste  ground,  and  running  parallel 
with  the  line  of  ships,  a  line  of  brown,  warm- 
toned  houses  seemed  bowed  under  snow- 
laden  roofs.  From  afar  at  the  end  of  Tsar 
Peter  .Straat,  issued  in  the  frosty  air  the 
tinkle  of  bells  of  the  horse  tram-cars,  appear- 
ing and  disappearing  in  the  opening  between 
the  buildings,  like  little  toy  carriages  har- 
nessed with  toy  horses  and  played  with  by 
people  that  appeared  no  bigger  than  children. 
I  was,  as  the  French  say,  biting  my  fists 
with  impatience  for  that  cargo  frozen  up- 
country;  with  rage  at  that  canal  set  fast,  at 
the  wintry  and  deserted  aspect  of  all  those 
ships  that  seemed  to  decay  in  grim  depres- 
sion for  want  of  the  open  water.  I  was  chief 
79 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

mate,  and  very  much  alone.  Directly  I  had 
joined  I  received  from  my  owners  instruc- 
tions to  send  all  the  ship's  apprentices  away 
on  leave  together,  because  in  such  weather 
there  was  nothing  for  anybody  to  do,  unless 
to  keep  up  a  fire  in  the  cabin  stove.  That 
was  attended  to  by  a  snuffy  and  mop-headed, 
inconceivably  dirty,  and  weirdly  toothless 
Dutch  ship-keeper,  who  could  hardly  speak 
three  words  of  English,  but  who  must  have 
had  some  considerable  knowledge  of  the 
language,  since  he  managed  invariably  to 
interpret  in  the  contrary  sense  everything 
that  was  said  to  him. 

Notwithstanding  the  little  iron  stove,  the 
ink  froze  on  the  swing-table  in  the  cabin, 
and  I  found  it  more  convenient  to  go  ashore 
stumbling  over  the  arctic  waste-land  and 
shivering  in  glazed  tram-cars  in  order  to 
write  my  evening  letter  to  my  owners  in  a 
gorgeous  cafe  in  the  centre  of  the  town.  It 
was  an  immense  place,  lofty  and  gilt,  up- 
holstered in  red  plush,  full  of  electric  lights, 
and  so  thoroughly  warmed  that  even  the 
marble  tables  felt  tepid  to  the  touch.  The 
waiter  who  brought  me  my  cup  of  coffee 
80 


The  Weight  of   the  Burden 

bore,  by  comparison  with  my  utter  isola- 
tion, the  dear  aspect  of  an  intimate  friend. 
There,  alone  in  a  noisy  crowd,  I  would  write 
slowly  a  letter  addressed  to  Glasgow,  of 
which  the  gist  would  be:  There  is  no  cargo, 
and  no  prospect  of  any  coming  till  late 
spring  apparently.  And  all  the  time  I  sat 
there  the  necessity  of  getting  back  to  the 
ship  bore  heavily  on  my  already  half-con- 
gealed spirits — the  shivering  in  glazed  tram- 
cars,  the  stumbling  over  the  snow-sprinkled 
waste  ground,  the  vision  of  ships  frozen  in  a 
row,  appearing  vaguely  like  corpses  of  black 
vessels  in  a  white  world,  so  silent,  so  lifeless, 
so  soulless  they  seemed  to  be. 

With  precaution  I  would  go  up  the  side  of 
my  own  particular  corpse,  and  would  feel 
her  as  cold  as  ice  itself  and  as  slippery  under 
my  feet.  My  cold  berth  would  swallow  up 
like  a  chilly  burial  niche  my  bodily  shivers 
and  my  mental  excitement.  It  was  a  cruel 
winter.  The  very  air  seemed  as  hard  and 
trenchant  as  steel;  but  it  would  have  taken 
much  more  than  this  to  extinguish  my 
sacred  fire  for  the  exercise  of  my  craft.  No 
young  man  of  twenty-four  appointed  chief 
81 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

mate  for  the  first  time  in  his  life  would  have 
let  that  Dutch  tenacious  winter  penetrate 
into  his  heart.  I  think  that  in  those  days  I 
never  forgot  the  fact  of  my  elevation  for  five 
consecutive  minutes.  I  fancy  it  kept  me 
warm,  even  in  my  slumbers,  better  than  the 
high  pile  of  blankets,  which  positively 
crackled  with  frost  as  I  threw  them  off  in 
the  morning.  And  I  would  get  up  early  for 
no  reason  whatever  except  that  I  was  in  sole 
charge.  The  new  captain  had  not  been  ap- 
pointed yet. 

Almost  each  morning  a  letter  from  my 
owners  would  arrive,  directing  me  to  go  to 
the  charterers  and  clamor  for  the  ship's 
cargo;  to  threaten  them  with  the  heaviest 
penalties  of  demurrage ;  to  demand  that  this 
assortment  of  varied  merchandise,  set  fast 
in  a  landscape  of  ice  and  windmills  some- 
where up-country,  should  be  put  on  rail  in- 
stantly, and  fed  up  to  the  ship  in  regular 
quantities  every  day.  After  drinking  some 
hot  coffee,  like  an  arctic  explorer  setting  off 
on  a  sledge  journey  towards  the  north  pole, 
I  would  go  ashore  and  roll  shivering  in  a 
tram-car  into  the  very  heart  of  the  town, 
82 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 


o 


past  clean-faced  houses,  past  thousands  of 
brass  knockers  upon  a  thousand  painted 
doors  glimmering  behind  rows  of  trees  of 
the  pavement  species,  leafless,  gaunt,  seem- 
ingly dead  forever. 

That  part  of  the  expedition  was  easy 
enough,  though  the  horses  were  painfully 
glistening  with  icicles,  and  the  aspect  of  the 
tram-conductors'  faces  presented  a  repulsive 
blending  of  crimson  and  purple.  But  as  to 
frightening  or  bullying,  or  even  wheedling 
some  sort  of  answer  out  of  Mr.  Hudig,  that 
was  another  matter  altogether.  He  was  a 
big,  swarthy  Netherlander,  with  black  mus- 
tache and  a  bold  glance.  He  always  began 
by  shoving  me  into  a  chair  before  I  had  time 
to  open  my  mouth,  gave  me  cordially  a  large 
cigar,  and  in  excellent  English  would  start 
to  talk  everlastingly  about  the  phenomenal 
severity  of  the  weather.  It  was  impossible 
to  threaten  a  man  who,  though  he  possessed 
the  language  perfectly,  seemed  incapable  of 
understanding  any  phrase  pronounced  in  a 
tone  of  remonstrance  or  discontent.  As  to 
quarrelling  with  him,  it  would  have  been 
stupid.  The  weather  was  too  bitter  for 
83 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

that.  His  office  was  so  warm,  his  fire  so 
bright,  his  sides  shook  so  heartily  with 
laughter,  that  I  experienced  always  a  great 
difficulty  in  making  up  my  mind  to  reach 
for  my  hat. 

At  last  the  cargo  did  come.  At  first  it 
came  dribbling  in  by  rail  in  trucks,  till  the 
thaw  set  in;  and  then  fast,  in  a  multitude  of 
barges,  with  a  great  rush  of  unbound  waters. 
The  gentle  master  stevedore  had  his  hands 
very  full  at  last ;  and  the  chief  mate  became 
worried  in  his  mind  as  to  the  proper  dis- 
tribution of  the  weight  of  his  first  cargo 
in  a  ship  he  did  not  personally  know  be- 
fore. 

Ships  do  want  humoring.  They  want 
humoring  in  handling;  and  if  you  mean  to 
handle  them  well,  they  must  have  been 
humored  in  the  distribution  of  the  weight 
which  you  ask  them  to  carry  through  the 
good  and  evil  fortune  of  a  passage.  Your 
ship  is  a  tender  creature,  whose  idiosyn- 
crasies must  be  attended  to  if  you  mean  her 
to  come,  with  credit  to  herself  and  you, 
through  the  rough-and-tumble  of  her  life. 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

So  seemed  to  think  the  new  captain,  who 
arrived  the  day  after  we  had  finished  load- 
ing, on  the  very  eve  of  the  day  of  sailing.  I 
first  beheld  him  on  the  quay,  a  complete 
stranger  to  me,  obviously  not  a  Hollander, 
in  a  black  bowler  and  a  short,  drab  over- 
coat, ridiculously  out  of  tone  with  the  winter 
aspect  of  the  waste-lands,  bordered  by  the 
brown  fronts  of  houses  with  their  roofs  drip- 
ping with  melting  snow. 

This  stranger  was  walking  up  and  down, 
absorbed  in  the  marked  contemplation  of 
the  ship's  fore-and-aft  trim;  but  when  I  saw 
him  squat  on  his  heels  in  the  slush  at  the 
very  edge  of  the  quay  to  peer  at  the  draught 
of  water  under  her  counter,  I  said  to  myself, 
"This  is  the  captain."  And  presently  I 
descried  his  luggage  coming  along  —  a  real 
sailor's  chest,  carried  by  means  of  rope- 
beckets  between  two  men,  with  a  couple  of 
leather  portmanteaus  and  a  roll  of  charts 
sheeted  in  canvas  piled  upon  the  lid.  The 
sudden,  spontaneous  agility  with  which  he 
bounded  aboard  right  off  the  rail  afforded 
me  the  first  glimpse  of  his  real  character. 
Without  further  preliminaries  than  a  friend- 
85 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ly  nod,  he  addressed  me:  "You  have  got  her 
pretty  well  in  her  fore-and-aft  trim.  Now 
what  about  your  weights  ?" 

I  told  him  I  had  managed  to  keep  the 
weight  sufficiently  well  up,  as  I  thought, 
one-third  of  the  whole  being  in  the  upper 
part  "above  the  beams,' '  as  the  technical 
expression  has  it.  He  whistled  "Phew!" 
scrutinizing  me  from  head  to  foot.  A  sort 
of  smiling  vexation  was  visible  on  his  ruddy 
face. 

"Well,  we  shall  have  a  lively  time  of  it 
this  passage,  I  bet,"  he  said. 

He  knew.  It  turned  out  he  had  been 
chief  mate  of  her  for  the  two  preceding  voy- 
ages; and  I  was  already  familiar  with  his 
handwriting  in  the  old  log-books  I  had  been 
perusing  in  my  cabin  with  a  natural  curi- 
osity, looking  up  the  records  of  my  new 
ship's  luck,  of  her  behavior,  of  the  good 
times  she  had  had,  and  of  the  troubles  she 
had  escaped. 

He  was  right  in  his  prophecy.  On  our 
passage  from  Amsterdam  to  Samarang  with 
a  general  cargo,  of  which,  alas!  only  one- 
third  in  weight  was  stowed  "above  the 
86 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

beams,' '  we  had  a  lively  time  of  it.  It  was 
lively,  but  not  joyful.  There  was  not  even 
a  single  moment  of  comfort  in  it,  because  no 
seaman  can  feel  comfortable  in  body  or 
mind  when  he  has  made  his  ship  uneasy. 

To  travel  along  with  a  cranky  ship  for 
ninety  days  or  so  is  no  doubt  a  nerve-trying 
experience ;  but  in  this  case  what  was  wrong 
with  our  craft  was  this:  that  by  my  system 
of  loading  she  had  been  made  much  too 
stable. 

Neither  before  nor  since  have  I  felt  a  ship 
roll  so  abruptly,  so  violently,  so  heavily. 
Once  she  began,  you  felt  that  she  would 
never  stop,  and  this  hopeless  sensation  char- 
acterizing the  motion  of  ships  whose  centre 
of  gravity  is  brought  down  too  low  in  load- 
ing made  every  one  on  board  weary  of  keep- 
ing on  his  feet.  I  remember  once  overhear- 
ing one  of  the  hands  say:  "By  Heavens, 
Jack!  I  feel  as  if  I  didn't  mind  how  soon  I 
let  myself  go,  and  let  the  blamed  hooker 
knock  my  brains  out  if  she  likes."  The 
captain  used  to  remark,  frequently:  "Ah, 
yes ;  I  dare  say  one  -  third  weight  above 
beams  would  have  been  quite  enough  for 
37 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

most  ships.  But  then,  you  see,  there's  no 
two  of  them  alike  on  the  seas,  and  she's  an 
uncommonly  ticklish  jade  to  load." 

Down  south,  running  before  the  gales  of 
high  latitudes,  she  made  our  life  a  burden 
to  us.  There  were  days  when  nothing 
would  keep  even  on  the  swing-tables,  when 
there  was  no  position  where  you  could  fix 
yourself  so  as  not  to  feel  a  constant  strain 
upon  all  the  muscles  of  your  body.  She 
rolled  and  rolled  with  an  awful  dislodging 
jerk  and  that  dizzily  fast  sweep  of  her  masts 
on  every  swing.  It  was  a  wonder  that  the 
men  sent  aloft  were  not  flung  off  the  yards, 
the  yards  not  flung  off  the  masts,  the  masts 
not  flung  overboard.  The  captain  in  his 
arm-chair,  holding  on  grimly  at  the  head  of 
the  table,  with  the  soup -tureen  rolling  on 
one  side  of  the  cabin  and  the  steward 
sprawling  on  the  other,  would  observe,  look- 
ing at  me:  " That's  your  one-third  above  the 
beams.  The  only  thing  that  surprises  me  is 
that  the  sticks  have  stuck  to  her  all  this 
time." 

Ultimately  some  of  the  minor  spars  did  go 
—  nothing  important :  spanker  -  booms  and 
88 


The  Weight  of  the  Burden 

such  like  —  because  at  times  the  frightful 
impetus  of  her  rolling  would  part  a  fourfold 
tackle  of  new  three-inch  Manila-line  as  if  it 
were  weaker  than  pack-thread. 

It  was  only  poetic  justice  that  the  chief 
mate,  who  had  made  a  mistake — perhaps  a 
half  excusable  one — about  the  distribution 
of  his  ship's  cargo,  should  pay  the  penalty. 
A  piece  of  one  of  the  minor  spars  that  did 
carry  away  flew  against  the  chief  mate's 
back,  and  sent  him  sliding  on  his  face  for 
quite  a  considerable  distance  along  the 
main -deck.  Thereupon  followed  various 
and  unpleasant  consequences  of  a  physical 
order — "queer  symptoms,"  as  the  captain, 
who  treated  them,  used  to  say;  inexplicable 
periods  of  powerlessness,  sudden  accesses  of 
mysterious  pain;  and  the  patient  agreed 
fully  with  the  regretful  mutters  of  his  very 
attentive  captain  wishing  that  it  had  been 
a  straightforward  broken  leg.  Even  the 
Dutch  doctor  who  took  the  case  up  in 
Samarang  offered  no  scientific  explanation. 
All  he  said,  was:  "Ah,  friend,  you  are  young 
yet;  it  may  be  very  serious  for  your  whole 
life.  You  must  leave  your  ship;  you  must 
89 


The   Mirror  of  the  Sea 

quite   silent   be   for   three   months  —  quite 
silent." 

Of  course,  he  meant  the  chief  mate  to 
keep  quiet — to  lay  up,  as  a  matter  of  fact. 
His  manner  was  impressive  enough,  if  his 
English  was  childishly  imperfect  when  com- 
pared with  the  fluency  of  Mr.  Hudig,  the 
figure  at  the  other  end  of  that  passage,  and 
memorable  enough  in  its  way.  In  a  great, 
airy  ward  of  a  Far  Eastern  hospital,  lying 
on  my  back,  I  had  plenty  of  leisure  to  re- 
member the  dreadful  cold  and  snow  of  Am- 
sterdam, while  looking  at  the  fronds  of  the 
palm-trees  tossing  and  rustling  at  the  height 
of  the  window.  I  could  remember  the 
elated  feeling  and  the  soul-gripping  cold  of 
those  tram- way  journeys  taken  into  town  to 
put  what  in  diplomatic  language  is  called 
pressure  upon  the  good  Hudig,  with  his 
warm  fire,  his  arm-chair,  his  big  cigar,  and 
the  never-failing  suggestion  in  his  good- 
natured  voice:  "I  suppose  in  the  end  it  is 
you  they  will  appoint  captain  before  the 
ship  sails?"  It  may  have  been  his  extreme 
good  -  nature,  the  serious,  unsmiling  good- 
nature of  a  fat,  swarthy  man  with  coal- 
90 


The  Weight  of   the  Burden 

black  mustache  and  steady  eyes;  but  he 
might  have  been  a  bit  of  a  diplomatist,  too. 
His  enticing  suggestions  I  used  to  repel 
modestly  by  the  assurance  that  it  was  ex- 
tremely unlikely,  as  I  had  not  enough  ex- 
perience. "You  know  very  well  how  to  go 
about  business  matters,"  he  used  to  say, 
with  a  sort  of  affected  moodiness  clouding 
his  serene,  round  face.  I  wonder  whether  he 
ever  laughed  to  himself  after  I  had  left  the 
office.  I  dare  say  he  never  did,  because  I 
understand  that  diplomatists,  in  and  out  of 
the  career,  take  themselves  and  their  tricks 
with  an  exemplary  seriousness. 

But  he  had  nearly  persuaded  me  that  I 
was  fit  in  every  way  to  be  trusted  with  a 
command.  There  came  three  months  of 
mental  worry,  hard  rolling,  remorse,  and 
physical  pain  to  drive  home  the  lesson  of  in- 
sufficient experience. 

Yes,  your  ship  wants  to  be  humored  with 
knowledge.  You  must  treat  with  an  un- 
derstanding consideration  the  mysteries  of 
her  feminine  nature,  and  then  she  will  stand 
by  you  faithfully  in  the  unceasing  struggle 
with  forces  wherein  defeat  is  no  shame.  It 
7  91 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

is  a  serious  relation,  that  in  which  a  man 
stands  to  his  ship.  She  has  her  rights  as 
though  she  could  breathe  and  speak;  and, 
indeed,  there  are  ships  that,  for  the  right 
man,  will  do  anything  but  speak,  as  the  say- 
ing goes. 

A  ship  is  not  a  slave.  You  must  make 
her  easy  in  a  sea-way,  you  must  never  forget 
that  you  owe  her  the  fullest  share  of  your 
thought,  of  your  skill,  of  your  self-love.  If 
you  remember  that  obligation,  naturally 
and  without  effort,  as  if  it  were  an  instinc- 
tive feeling  of  your  inner  life,  she  will  sail, 
stay,  run  for  you  as  long  as  she  is  able,  or, 
like  a  sea-bird  going  to  rest  upon  the  angry 
waves,  she  will  lay  out  the  heaviest  gale  that 
ever  made  you  doubt  living  long  enough  to 
see  another  sunrise. 


Overdue    and   Missing 


jFTEN  I  turn  with  melancholy 
eagerness  to  the  space  reserved 
in  the  newspapers  under  the 
general  heading  of  "Shipping 
Intelligence."  I  meet  there  the 
names  of  ships  I  have  known.  Every  year 
some  of  <these  names  disappear — the  names 
of  old  friends.     Tempi  passati  ! 

The  different  divisions  of  that  kind  of 
news  are  set  down  in  their  order,  which 
varies  but  slightly  in  its  arrangement  of 
concise  head-lines.  And  first  comes  "  Speak- 
ings"— reports  of  ships  met  and  signalled  at 
sea,  name,  port,  where  from,  where  bound 
for,  so  many  days  out,  ending  frequently  with 
the  words  "All  well."  Then  come  "Wrecks 
and  Casualties" — a  longish  array  of  para- 
graphs, unless  the  weather  has  been  fair  and 
clear,  and  friendly  to  ships  all  over  the  world. 
93 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

On  some  days  there  appears  the  heading 
"Overdue" — an  ominous  threat  of  loss  and 
sorrow  trembling  yet  in  the  balance  of  fate. 
There  is  something  sinister  to  a  seaman  in  the 
very  grouping  of  the  letters  which  form  this 
word,  clear  in  its  meaning,  and  seldom 
threatening  in  vain. 

Only  a  very  few  days  more — appallingly 
few  to  the  hearts  which  had  set  themselves 
bravely  to  hope  against  hope — three  weeks, 
a  month  later,  perhaps,  the  name  of  ships 
under  the  blight  of  the  "Overdue"  heading 
shall  appear  again  in  the  column  of  "  Ship- 
ping Intelligence,"  but  under  the  final  dec- 
laration of  "Missing." 

"The  ship  (or  bark,  or  brig)  so-and-so, 
bound  from  such  a  port,  with  such  and  such 
cargo,  for  such  another  port,  having  left  at 
such  and  such  a  date,  last  spoken  at  sea  on 
such  a  day,  and  never  having  been  heard  of 
since,  was  posted  to-day  as  missing."  Such 
in  its  strictly  official  eloquence  is  the  form 
of  funeral  orations  on  ships  that,  perhaps 
wearied  with  a  long  struggle,  or  in  some  un- 
guarded moment  that  may  come  to  the 
readiest  of  us,  had  let  themselves  be  over- 
94 


Overdue   and   Missing 

whelmed  by  a  sudden  blow  from  the  en- 
emy. 

Who  can  say?  Perhaps  the  men  she  car- 
ried had  asked  her  to  do  too  much,  had 
stretched  beyond  breaking-point  the  endur- 
ing faithfulness  which  seems  wrought  and 
hammered  into  that  assemblage  of  iron  ribs 
and  plating,  of  wood  and  steel  and  canvas 
and  wire,  which  -goes  to  the  making  of  a  ship 
— a  complete  creation  endowed  with  char- 
acter, individuality,  qualities  and  defects, 
by  men  whose  hands  launch  her  upon  the 
water,  and  that  other  men  shall  learn  to 
know  with  an  intimacy  surpassing  the  in- 
timacy of  man  with  man,  to  love  with  a  love 
nearly  as  great  as  that  of  man  for  woman, 
and  often  as  blind  in  its  infatuated  disre- 
gard of  defects. 

There  are  ships  which  bear  a  bad  name, 
but  I  have  yet  to  meet  one  whose  crew  for 
the  time  being  failed  to  stand  up  angrily  for 
her  against  every  criticism.  One  ship  which 
I  call  to  mind  now  had  the  reputation  of 
killing  somebody  every  voyage  she  made. 
This  was  no  calumny,  and  yet  I  remember 
well,  somewhere  far  back  in  the  late  seven- 
95 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ties,  that  the  crew  of  that  ship  were,  if  any- 
thing, rather  proud  of  her  evil  fame,  as  if 
they  had  been  an  utterly  corrupt  lot  of 
desperadoes  glorying  in  their  association 
with  an  atrocious  creature.  We,  belonging 
to  other  vessels  moored  all  about  the  Circular 
Quay  in  Sydney,  used  to  shake  our  heads  at 
her  with  a  great  sense  of  the  unblemished 
virtue  of  our  own  well-loved  ships. 

I  shall  not  pronounce  her  name.  She  is 
"missing"  now,  after  a  sinister,  but,  from 
the  point  of  view  of  her  owners,  a  useful 
career  extending  over  many  years,  and,  I 
should  say,  across  every  ocean  of  our  globe. 
Having  killed  a  man  for  every t  voyage,  and 
perhaps  rendered  more  misanthropic  by  the 
infirmities  that  come  with  years  upon  a  ship, 
she  had  made  up  her  mind  to  kill  all  hands 
at  once  before  leaving  the  scene  of  her  ex- 
ploits. A  fitting  end,  this,  to  a  life  of  use- 
fulness and  crime — in  a  last  outburst  of  an 
evil  passion  supremely  satisfied  on  some 
wild  night,  perhaps,  to  the  applauding 
clamor  of  wind  and  wave. 

How  did  she  do  it?  In  the  word  "miss- 
ing" there  is  a  horrible  depth  of  doubt  and 
9$ 


Overdue  and   Missing 

speculation.  Did  she  go  quickly  from  under 
the  men's  feet,  or  did  she  resist  to  the  end, 
letting  the  sea  batter  her  to  pieces,  start  her 
butts,  wrench  her  frame,  load  her  with  an 
increasing  weight  of  salt-water,  and,  dis- 
masted, unmanageable,  rolling  heavily,  her 
boats  gone,  her  decks  swept,  had  she  wearied 
her  men  half  to  death  with  the  unceasing 
labor  at  the  pumps  before  she  sank  with 
them  like  a  stone? 

However,  such  a  case  must  be  rare.  I 
imagine  a  raft  of  some  sort  could  always  be 
contrived;  and,  even  if  it  saved  no  one,  it 
would'  float  on  and  be  picked  up,  perhaps 
conveying  some  hint  of  the  vanished  name. 
Then  that  ship  would  not  be,  properly 
speaking,  missing.  She  would  be  "lost  with 
all  hands,"  and  in  that  distinction  there  is  a 
subtle  difference — less  horror  and  a  less  ap- 
palling darkness. 


The  unholy  fascination  of  dread  dwells  in 
the  thought  of  the  last  moments  of  a  ship 
reported  as  " missing"  in  the  columns  of  the 
97 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Shipping  Gazette.  Nothing  of  her  ever  comes 
to  light — no  grating,  no  life-buoy,  no  piece 
of  boat  or  branded  oar — to  give  a  hint  of 
the  place  and  date  of  her  sudden  end.  The 
Shipping  Gazette  does  not  even  call  her  "  lost 
with  all  hands."  She  remains  simply  "miss- 
ing"; she  has  disappeared  enigmatically  into 
a  mystery  of  fate  as  big  as  the  world,  where 
your  imagination  of  a  brother-sailor,  of  a 
fellow-servant  and  lover  of  ships,  may 
range  unchecked. 

And  yet  sometimes  one  gets  a  hint  of 
what  the  last  scene  may  be  like  in  the  life  of 
a  ship  and  her  crew,  which  resembles  a 
drama  in  its  struggle  against  a  great  force 
bearing  it  up,  formless,  ungraspable,  chaotic 
and  mysterious  as  fate. 

It  was  on  a  gray  afternoon  in  the  lull  of  a 
three  days'  gale  that  had  left  the  Southern 
Ocean  tumbling  heavily  upon  our  ship,  un- 
der a  sky  hung  with  rags  of  clouds  that 
seemed  to  have  been  cut  and  hacked  by  the 
keen  edge  of  a  sou 'west  gale. 

Our  craft,  a  Clyde-built  bark  of  one  thou- 
sand tons,  rolled  so  heavily  that  something 
aloft  had  carried  away.  No  matter  what  the 
98 


Overdue  and  Missing 

damage  was,  but  it  was  serious  enough  to 
induce  me  to  go  aloft  myself  with  a  couple 
of  hands  and  the  carpenter  to  see  the  tem- 
porary repairs  properly  done. 

Sometimes  we  had  to  drop  everything  and 
cling  with  both  hands  to  the  swaying  spars, 
holding  our  breath  in  fear  of  a  terribly 
heavy  roll.  And,  wallowing  as  if  she  meant 
to  turn  over  with  us,  the  bark,  her  decks 
full  of  water,  her  gear  flying  in  bights,  ran 
at  some  ten  knots  an  hour.  We  had  been 
driven  far  south — much  farther  that  way 
than  we  had  meant  to  go ;  and  suddenly,  up 
there  in  the  slings  of  the  foreyard,  in  the 
midst  of  our  work,  I  felt  my  shoulder 
gripped  with  such  force  in  the  carpenter's 
powerful  paw  that  I  positively  yelled  with 
unexpected  pain.  The  man's  eyes  stared 
close  in  my  face,  and  he  shouted,  "Look, 
sir!  look!  What's  this?"  pointing  ahead 
with  his  other  hand. 

At  first  I  saw  nothing.  The  sea  was  one 
empty  wilderness  of  black-and-white  hills. 
Suddenly,  half  concealed  in  the  tumult  of 
the  foaming  rollers  I  made  out  awash, 
something  enormous,  rising  and  falling — 
99 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

something  spread  out  like  a  burst  of  foam, 
but  with  a  more  bluish,  more  solid  look. 

It  was  a  piece  of  an  ice-floe  melted  down 
to  a  fragment,  but  still  big  enough  to  sink  a 
ship,  and  floating  lower  than  any  raft,  right 
in  our  way,  as  if  ambushed  among  the  waves 
with  murderous  intent.  There  was  no  time 
to  get  down  on  deck.  I  shouted  from  aloft 
till  my  head  was  ready  to  split.  I  was 
heard  aft,  and  we  managed  to  clear  the 
sunken  floe  which  had  come  all  the  way 
from  the  southern  ice-cap  to  have  a  try  at 
our  unsuspecting  lives.  Had  it  been  an 
hour  later,  nothing  could  have  saved  the 
ship,  for  no  eye  could  have  made  out  in  the 
dusk  that  pale  piece  of  ice  swept  over  by 
the  white-crested  waves. 

And  as  we  stood  near  the  taffrail  side  by 
side,  my  captain  and  I,  looking  at  it,  hardly 
discernible  already,  but  still  quite  close-to 
on  our  quarter,  he  remarked  in  a  meditative, 
tone: 

"But  for  the  turn  of  that  wheel  just  in 
time  there  would  have  been  another  case  of 
a  'missing'  ship." 

Nobody  ever  comes  back  from  a  "miss- 


Overdue  and  IVUs&ing 

ing"  ship  to  tell  how  hard  was  the  death  of 
the  craft,  and  how  sudden  and  overwhelm- 
ing the  last  anguish  of  her  men.  Nobody- 
can  say  with  what  thoughts,  with  what  re- 
grets, with  what  words  on  their  lips  they 
died.  But  there  is  something  fine  in  the 
sudden  passing  away  of  these  hearts  from 
the  extremity  of  struggle  and  stress  and  tre- 
mendous uproar — from  the  vast,  unrest ful 
rage  of  the  surface  to  the  profound  peace  of 
the  depths,  sleeping  untroubled  since  the 
beginning  of  ages. 


But  if  the  word  "missing"  brings  all  hope 
to  an  end  and  settles  the  loss  of  the  under- 
writers, the  word  "overdue"  confirms  the 
fears  already  born  in  many  homes  ashore, 
and  opens  the  door  of  speculation  in  the 
market  of  risks. 

Maritime  risks,  be  it  understood.  There 
is  a  class  of  optimists  ready  to  reinsure  an 
"overdue"  ship  at  a  heavy  premium.  But 
nothing  can  insure  the  hearts  on  shore  against 
the  bitterness  of  waiting  for  the  worst. 

IPX 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

For  if  a  " missing' '  ship  has  never  turned 
up  within  the  memory  of  seamen  of  my  gen- 
eration, the  name  of  an  "overdue"  ship, 
trembling  as  it  were  on  the  edge  of  the  fatal 
heading,  has  been  known  to  appear  as  "ar- 
rived." 

It  must  blaze  up,  indeed,  with  a  great 
brilliance  the  dull,  printers'  ink  expended  on 
the  assemblage  of  the  few  letters  that  form 
the  ship's  name  to  the  anxious  eyes  scanning 
the  page  in  fear  and  trembling.  It  is  like 
the  message  of  reprieve  from  the  sentence 
of  sorrow  suspended  over  many  a  home, 
even  if  some  of  the  men  in  her  have  been 
the  most  homeless  mortals  that  you  may 
find  among  the  wanderers  of  the  sea. 

The  reinsurer,  the  optimist  of  ill-luck  and 
disaster,  slaps  his  pocket  with  satisfaction. 
The  underwriter,  who  had  been  trying  to 
minimize  the  amount  of  impending  loss,  re- 
grets his  premature  pessimism.  The  ship 
has  been  stancher,  the  skies  more  merciful, 
the  seas  less  angry,  or  perhaps  the  men  on 
board  of  a  finer  temper  than  he  has  been 
willing  to  take  for  granted. 

"The  ship  So-and-so,   bound  to  such   a 

102 


Overdue  and  Missing 

port,  and  posted  as  'overdue,'  was  reported 
yesterday  as  having  arrived  safely  at  her 
destination." 

Thus  run  the  official  words  of  the  reprieve 
addressed  to  the  hearts  ashore  lying  under 
a  heavy  sentence.  And  they  come  swiftly 
from  the  other  side  of  the  earth,  over  wires 
and  cables,  for  your  electric  telegraph  is 
a  great  alleviator  of  anxiety.  Details,  of 
course,  shall  follow.  And  they  may  unfold 
a  tale  of  narrow  escape,  of  steady  ill-luck,  of 
high  winds  and  heavy  weather,  of  ice,  of  in- 
terminable calms  or  endless  head -gales;  a 
tale  of  difficulties  overcome,  of  adversity  de- 
fied by  a  small  knot  of  men  upon  the  great 
loneliness  of  the  sea;  a  tale  of  resource,  of 
courage — of  helplessness,  perhaps. 

Of  all  ships  disabled  at  sea,  a  steamer  who 
has  lost  her  propeller  is  the  most  helpless. 
And  if  she  drifts  into  an  unpopulated  part 
of  the  ocean  she  may  soon  become  overdue. 
The  menace  of  the  "overdue"  and  the 
finality  of  "missing"  come  very  quickly  to 
steamers  whose  life,  fed  on  coals  and  breath- 
ing the  black  breath  of  smoke  into. the  air, 
goes  on  in  disregard  of  wind  and  wave. 
">3 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Such  a  one,  a  big  steamship,  too,  whose 
working  life  had  been  a  record  of  faithful 
keeping  time  from  land  to  land,  in  disregard 
of  wind  and  sea,  once  lost  her  propeller 
down  south,  on  her  passage  out  to  New 
Zealand. 

It  was  the  wintry,  murky  time  of  cold 
gales  and  heavy  seas.  With  the  snapping 
of  her  tail-shaft  her  life  seemed  suddenly  to 
depart  from  her  big  body,  and  from  a  stub- 
born, arrogant  existence  she  passed  all  at 
once  into  the  passive  state  of  a  drifting  log. 
A  ship  sick  with  her  own  weakness  has  not 
the  pathos  of  a  ship  vanquished  in  a  battle 
with  the  elements,  wherein  consists  the  inner 
drama  of  her  life.  No  seaman  can  look 
without  'compassion  upon  a  disabled  ship, 
but  to  look  at  a  sailing-vessel  with  her  lofty 
spars  gone  is  to  look  upon  a  defeated  but  in- 
domitable warrior.  There  is  defiance  in  the 
remaining  stumps  of  her  masts,  raised  up 
like  maimed  limbs  against  the  menacing 
scowl  of  a  stormy  sky;  there  is  high  courage 
in  the  upward  sweep  of  her  lines  towards 
the  bow;  and  as  soon  as,  on  a  hastily  rigged 
spar,  a  strip  of  canvas  is  shown  to  the  wind 
104 


Overdue  and  Missing 

to  keep  her  head  to  sea,  she  faces  the  waves 
again  with  an  unsubdued  courage. 


The  efficiency  of  a  steamship  consists  not 
so  much  in  her  courage  as  in  the  power  she 
carries  within  herself.  It  beats  and  throbs 
like  a  pulsating  'heart  within  her  iron  ribs, 
and  when  it  stops,  the  steamer,  whose  life  is 
not  so  much  a  contest  as  the  disdainful  ig- 
noring of  the  sea,  sickens  and  dies  upon  the 
waves.  The  sailing-ship,  with  her  unthrob- 
bing  body,  seemed  to  lead  mysteriously  a 
sort  of  unearthly  existence,  bordering  upon 
the  magic  of  the  invisible  forces,  sustained 
by  the  inspiration  of  life-giving  and  death- 
dealing  winds. 

So  that  big  steamer,  dying  by  a  sudden 
stroke,  drifted,  an  unwieldy  corpse,  away 
from  the  track  of  other  ships.  And  she 
would  have  been  posted  really  as  u  overdue," 
or  maybe  as  "missing,"  had  she  not  been 
sighted  in  a  snow-storm,  vaguely,  like  a 
strange,  rolling  island,  by  a  whaler  going 
north  from  her  polar  cruising  -  ground. 
105 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

There  was  plenty  of  food  on  board,  and  I 
don't  know  whether  the  nerves  of  her  pas- 
sengers were  at  all  affected  by  anything  else 
than  the  sense  of  interminable  boredom  or 
the  vague  fear  of  that  unusual  situation. 
Does  a  passenger  ever  feel  the  life  of  the 
ship  in  which  he  is  being  carried  like  a  sort 
of  honored  bale  of  highly  sensitive  goods? 
For  a  man  who  has  never  been  a  passenger 
it  is  impossible  to  say.  But  I  know  that 
there  is  no  harder  trial  for  a  seaman  than  to 
feel  a  dead  ship  under  his  feet. 

There  is  no  mistaking  that  sensation,  so 
dismal,  so  tormenting  and  so  subtle,  so  full 
of  unhappiness  and  unrest.  I  could  im- 
agine no  worse  eternal  punishment  for  evil 
seamen  who  die  unrepentant  upon  the 
earthly  sea  than  that  their  souls  should  be 
condemned  to  man  the  ghosts  of  disabled 
ships,  drifting  forever  across  a  ghostly  and 
tempestuous  ocean. 

She  must  have  looked  ghostly  enough, 
that  broken-down  steamer,  rolling  in  that 
snow-storm — a  dark  apparition  in  a  world 
of  white  snow-flakes  to  the  staring  eyes  of 
that  whaler's  crew.  Evidently  they  didn't 
1 06 


Overdue  and  Missing 

believe  in  ghosts,  for  on  arrival  into  port 
her  captain  unromantically  reported  having 
sighted  a  disabled  steamer  in  latitude  some- 
where about  500  S.  and  a  longitude  still 
more  uncertain.  Other  steamers  came  out 
to  look  for  her,  and  ultimately  towed  her 
away  from  the  cold  edge  of  the  world  into  a 
harbor  with  docks  and  work-shops,  where, 
with  many  blows  of  hammers,  her  pulsating 
heart  of  steel  was  set  going  again  to  go  forth 
presently  in  the  renewed  pride  of  its  strength, 
fed  on  fire  and  water,  breathing  black 
smoke  into  the  air,  pulsating,  throbbing, 
shouldering  its  arrogant  way  against  the 
great  rollers  in  blind  disdain  of  winds  and 
sea. 

The  track  she  had  made  when  drifting 
while  her  heart  stood  still  within  her  iron 
ribs  looked  like  a  tangled  thread  on  the 
white  paper  of  the  chart.  It  was  shown  to 
me  by  a  friend,  her  second  officer.  In  that 
surprising  tangle  there  were  words  in  minute 
letters— "gales/'  "thick  fog,"  "ice"— writ- 
ten by  him  here  and  there  as  memoranda  of 
the  weather.  She  had  interminably  turned 
upon  her  tracks,  she  had  crossed  and  re- 
s  107 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

crossed  her  hap-hazard  path  till  it  resembled 
nothing  so  much  as  a  puzzling  maze  of  pen- 
cilled lines  without  a  meaning.  But  in  that 
maze  there  lurked  all  the  romance  of  the 
"overdue"  and  a  menacing  hint  of  "miss- 
ing." 

"We  had  three  weeks  of  it,"  said  my 
friend.     "  Just  think  of  that ! ' ' 

"How  do  you  feel  about  it?"  I  asked. 

He  waved  his  hand  as  much  as  to  say: 
It's  all  in  the  day's  work.  But  then,  ab- 
ruptly, as  if  making  up  his  mind: 

"I'll  tell  you.  Towards  the  last  I  used  to 
shut  myself  up  in  my  berth  and  cry." 

"Cry?" 

"Shed  tears,"  he  explained,  briefly,  and 
rolled  up  the  chart. 

I  can  answer  for  it,  he  was  a  good  man — 
as  good  as  ever  stepped  upon  a  ship's  deck — 
but  he  could  not  bear  the  feeling  of  a  dead 
ship  under  his  feet :  the  sickly,  disheartening 
feeling  which  the  men  of  some  "overdue" 
ships  that  come  into  harbor  at  last  under  a 
jury-rig  must  have  felt,  combated,  and  over- 
come in  the  faithful  discharge  of  their  duty. 


The  Grip  of  the  Land 


IT  is  difficult  for  a  seaman  to  be- 
lieve that  his  stranded  ship 
does  not  feel  as  unhappy  at 
the  unnatural  predicament  of 
having  no  water  under  her 
keel  as  he  is  himself  at  feeling  her  stranded. 
Stranding  is,  indeed,  the  reverse  of  sink- 
ing. The  sea  does  not  close  upon  the 
water-logged  hull  with  a  sunny  ripple,  or 
maybe  with  the  angry  rush  of  a  curling 
wave,  erasing  her  name  from  the  roll  of  liv- 
ing ships.  No.  It  is  as  if  an  invisible  hand 
had  been  stealthily  uplifted  from  the  bot- 
tom to  catch  hold  of  her  keel  as  it  glides 
through  the  water. 

More  than  any  other  event  does  "strand- 
ing" bring  to  the  sailor  a  sense  of  utter  and 
dismal   failure.     There   are   strandings   and 
strandings,  but  I  am  safe  to  say  that  ninety 
109 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

per  cent,  of  them  are  occasions  in  which  a 
sailor,  without  dishonor,  may  well  wish  him- 
self dead ;  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  of  those 
who  had  the  experience  of  their  ship  taking 
the  ground,  ninety  per  cent,  did  actually  for 
five  seconds  or  so  wish  themselves  dead. 

"Taking  the  ground"  is  the  professional 
expression  for  a  ship  that  is  stranded  in 
gentle  circumstances.  But  the  feeling  is 
more  as  if  the  ground  had  taken  hold  of  her. 
It  is  for  those  on  her  deck  a  surprising  sen- 
sation. It  is  as  if  your  feet  had  been 
caught  in  an  imponderable  snare;  you  feel 
the  balance  of  your  body  threatened,  and 
the  steady  poise  of  your  mind  is  destroyed 
at  once.  This  sensation  lasts  only  a  second, 
for  even  while  you  stagger  something  seems 
to  turn  over  in  your  head,  bringing  upper- 
most the  mental  exclamation,  full  of  aston- 
ishment and  dismay,  "  By  Jove!  she's  on  the 
ground!" 

And  that  is  very  terrible.  After  all,  the 
only  mission  of  a  seaman's  calling  is  to  keep 
ships'  keels  off  the  ground.  Thus  the  mo- 
ment of  her  stranding  takes  away  from  him 
every  excuse  for  his  continued  existence, 
no 


The  Grip  of  the  Land 

To  keep  ships  afloat  is  his  business;  it  is  his 
trust;  it  is  the  effective  formula  of  the  bot- 
tom of  all  these  vague  impulses,  dreams,  and 
illusions  that  go  to  the  making  up  of  a  boy's 
vocation.  The  grip  of  the  land  upon  the 
keel  of  your  ship,  even  if  nothing  worse 
comes  of  it  than  the  wear  and  tear  of  tackle 
and  the  loss  of  time,  remains  in  a  seaman's 
memory,  an  indelibly  fixed  taste  of  disaster. 
"  Stranded,"  within  the  meaning  of  this 
paper,  stands  for  a  more  or  less  excusable 
mistake.  A  ship  may  be  "driven  ashore" 
by  stress  of  weather.  It  is  a  catastrophe,  a 
defeat.  To  be  "run  ashore"  has  the  little- 
ness, poignancy,  and  bitterness  of  human 
error. 


That  is  why  your  "strandings"  are  for 
the  most  part  so  unexpected.  In  fact,  they 
are  all  unexpected,  except  those  heralded  by 
some  short  glimpse  of  the  danger,  full  of  agi- 
tation and  excitement,  like  an  awakening 
from  a  dream  of  incredible  folly. 

The  land  suddenly  at  night  looms  up  right 
in 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

over  your  bows,  or  perhaps  the  cry  of 
" Broken  water  ahead!"  is  raised,  and  some 
long  mistake,  some  complicated  edifice  of 
self-delusion,  overconfidence,  and  wrong  rea- 
soning is  brought  down  in  a  fatal  shock,  and 
the  heart-searing  experience  of  your  ship's 
keel  scraping  and  scrunching  over,  say,  a 
coral  reef.  It  is  a  sound,  for  its  size,  far 
more  terrific  to  your  soul  than  that  of  a 
world  coming  violently  to  an  end.  But  out 
of  that  chaos  your  belief  in  your  own  pru- 
dence and  sagacity  reasserts  itself.  You  ask 
yourself,  Where  on  earth  did  I  get  to? 
How  on  earth  did  I  get  there?  with  a  con- 
viction that  it  could  not  be  your  own  act, 
that  there  has  been  at  work  some  mysteri- 
ous conspiracy  of  accident;  that  the  charts 
are  all  wrong,  and  if  the  charts  are  not 
wrong,  that  land  and.  sea  have  changed  their 
places ;  that  your  misfortune  shall  forever  re- 
main inexplicable,  since  you  have  lived  al- 
ways wTith  the  sense  of  your  trust,  the  last 
thing  on  closing  your  eyes,  the  first  on  open- 
ing them,  as  if  your  mind  had  kept  firm 
hold  of  your  responsibility  during  the  hours 
of  sleep. 

112 


The  Grip  of  the  Land 

You  contemplate  mentally  your  mis- 
chance, till  little  by  little  your  mood  changes, 
cold  doubt  steals  into  the  very  marrow  of 
your  bones,  you  see  the  inexplicable  fact  in 
another  light.  That  is  the  time  when  you 
ask  yourself,  How  on  earth  could  I  have 
been  fool  enough  to  get  there?  And  you 
are  ready  to  renounce  all  belief  in  your  good 
sense,  in  your  knowledge,  in  your  fidelity, 
in  what  you  thought  till  then  was  the  best 
in  you,  giving  you  the  daily  bread  of  life  and 
the  moral  support  of  other  men's  confidence. 

The  ship  is  lost  or  not  lost.  Once  strand- 
ed, you  have  to  do  your  best  by  her.  She 
may  be  saved  by  your  efforts,  by  your  re- 
source and  fortitude  bearing  up  against  the 
heavy  weight  of  guilt  and  failure.  And 
there  are  justifiable  strandings  in  fogs, 
on  unchartered  seas,  on  dangerous  shores 
through  treacherous  tides.  But,  saved 
not  saved,  there  remains  with  her  com 
mander  a  distinct  sense  of  loss,  a  flavor 
the  mouth  of  the  real,  abiding  danger  that 
lurks  in  all  the  forms  of  human  existence, 
It  is  an  acquisition,  too,  that  feeling.  A 
man  may  be  the  better  for  it,  but  he  will 
"3 


E 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

not  be  the  same.  Damocles  has  seen  the 
sword  suspended  by  a  hair  over  his  head, 
and  though  a  good  man  need  not  be  made 
less  valuable  by  such  a  knowledge,  the  feast 
shall  not  henceforth  have  the  same  flavor. 

Years  ago  I  was  concerned  as  chief  mate 
in  a  case  of  stranding  which  was  not  fatal  to 
the  ship.  We  went  to  work  for  ten  hours 
on  end,  laying  out  anchors  in  readiness  to 
heave  off  at  high-water.  While  I  was  still 
busy  about  the  decks  forward  I  heard  the 
steward  at  my  elbow  saying:  "The  captain 
asks  whether  you  mean  to  come  in,  sir,  and 
have  something  to  eat  to-day.' ' 

I  went  into  the  cuddy.  My  captain  sat 
at  the  head  of  the  table  like  a  statue.  There 
was  a  strange  motionlessness  of  everything 
in  that  pretty  little  cabin.  The  swing-table 
which  for  seventy  odd  days  had  been  always 
on  the  move,  if  ever  so  little,  hung  quite  still 
above  the  soup-tureen.  Nothing  could  have 
altered  the  rich  color  of  my  commander's 
complexion,  laid  on  generously  by  wind  and 
sea;  but  between  the  two  tufts  of  fair  hair 
above  his  ears,  his  skull,  generally  suffused 
with  the  hue  of  blood,  shone  dead  white, 
114 


The  Grip  of  the  Land 

like  a  dome  of  ivory.  And  he  looked 
strangely  untidy.  I  perceived  he  had  not 
shaved  himself  that  day ;  and  yet  the  wildest 
motion  of  the  ship  in  the  most  stormy  lati- 
tudes we  had  passed  through,  never  made 
him  miss  one  single  morning  ever  since  we 
left  the  Channel.  The  fact  must  be  that  a 
commander  cannot  possibly  shave  himself 
when  his  ship-  is  aground.  I  have  com- 
manded ships  myself,  but  I  don't  know;  I 
have  never  tried  to  shave  in  my  life. 

He  did  not  offer  to  help  me  or  himself  till 
I  had  coughed  markedly  several  times.  I 
talked  to  him  professionally  in  a  cheery 
tone,  and  ended  with  the  confident  asser- 
tion: 

"We  shall  get  her  off  by  midnight,  sir." 

He  smiled  faintly  without  looking  up,  and 
muttered  as  if  to  himself: 

"Yes,  yes;  the  captain  put  the  ship  ashore 
and  we  got  her  off." 

Then,  raising  his  head,  he  attacked  grum- 
pily the  steward,  a  lanky,  anxious  youth  with 
a  long,  pale  face  and  two  big  front  teeth. 

"What  makes  this  soup  so  bitter?  I  am 
surprised  the  mate  can  swallow  the  beastly 

us 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

stuff.  I'm  sure  the  cook's  ladled  some  salt- 
water into  it  by  mistake." 

The  charge  was  so  outrageous  that  the 
steward,  for  all  answer,  only  dropped  his  eye- 
lids bashfully. 

There  was  nothing  the  matter  with  the 
soup.  I  had  a  second  helping.  My  heart 
was  warm  with  hours  of  hard  work  at  the 
head  of  a  willing  crew.  I  was  elated  with 
having  handled  heavy  anchors,  cables,  boats, 
without  the  slightest  hitch;  pleased  with 
having  laid  out  scientifically  bower,  stream, 
and  kedge  exactly  where  I  believed  they 
would  do  most  good.  On  that  occasion  the 
bitter  taste  of  a  stranding  was  not  for  my 
mouth.  That  experience  came  later,  and  it 
was  only  then  that  I  understood  the  loneli- 
ness of  the  man  in  charge. 

It's  the  captain  who  puts  the  ship  ashore; 
it's  we  who  get  her  off. 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 


'T  seems  to  me  that  no  man  born 
and  truthful  to  himself  could 
declare  that  he  ever  saw  the 
sea  looking  young  as  the  earth 
looks  young  in  spring.  But 
some  of  us,  regarding  the  ocean  with  under- 
standing and  affection,  have  seen  it  looking 
old,  as  if  the  immemorial  ages  had  been 
stirred  up  from  ,the  undisturbed  bottom  of 
ooze.  For  it  is  a  gale  of  wind  that  makes 
the  sea  look  old. 

From  a  distance  of  years,  looking  at  the 
remembered  aspects  of  the  storms  lived 
through,  it  is  that  impression  which  disen- 
gages itself  clearly  from  the  great  body  of 
impressions  left  by  many  years  of  intimate 
contact. 

If  you  would  know  the  age  of  the  earth, 
look  upon  the  sea  in  a  storm.     The  grayness 
117 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

of  the  whole  immense  surface,  the  wind  fur- 
rows upon  the  faces  of  the  waves,  the  great 
masses  of  foam,  tossed  about  and  waving 
like  matted  white  locks,  give  to  the  sea  in  a 
gale  an  appearance  of  hoary  age,  lustreless, 
dull,  without  gleams,  as  though  it  had  been 
created  before  light  itself. 

Looking  back  after  much  love  and  much 
trouble,  the  instinct  of  primitive  man,  who 
seeks  to  personify  the  forces  of  Nature  for 
his  affection  and  for  his  fear,  is  awakened 
again  in  the  breast  of  one  civilized  beyond 
that  stage  even  in  his  infancy.  One  seems 
to  have  known  gales  as  enemies,  and  even  as 
enemies  one  embraces  them  in  that  affection- 
ate regret  which  clings  to  the  past. 

Gales  have  their  personalities,  and,  after 
all,  perhaps  it  is  not  strange ;  for,  when  all  is 
said  and  done,  they  are  adversaries  whose 
wiles  you  must  defeat,  whose  violence  you 
must  resist,  and  yet  with  whom  you  must 
live  in  the  intimacies  of  nights  and  days. 

Here  speaks  the  man  of  masts  and  sails, 

to  whom  the  sea  is  not  a  navigable  element, 

but  an  intimate  companion.     The  length  of 

passages,  the  growing  sense  of  solitude,  the 

118 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

close  dependence  upon  the  very  forces  that, 
friendly  to-day,  without  changing  their  nat- 
ure, by  the  mere  putting  forth  of  their 
might,  become  dangerous  to-morrow,  make 
for  that  sense  of  fellowship  which  modern 
seamen,  good  men  as  they  are,  cannot  hope 
to  know.  And,  besides,  your  modern  ship, 
which  is  a  steamship,  makes  her  passages  on 
other  principles  than  yielding  to  the  weather 
and  humoring  the  sea.  She  receives  smash- 
ing blows,  but  she  advances ;  it  is  a  slogging 
fight,  and  not  a  scientific  campaign.  The 
machinery,  the  steel,  the  fire,  the  steam 
have  stepped  in  between  the  man  and  the 
sea.  A  modern  fleet  of  ships  does  not  so 
much  make  use  of  the  sea  as  exploit  a  high- 
way. The  modern  ship  is  not  the  sport  of 
the  'waves.  Let  us  say  that  each  of  her 
voyages  is  a  triumphant  progress ;  and  yet  it 
is  a  question  whether  it  is  not  a  more  subtle 
and  more  human  triumph  to  be  the  sport  of 
the  waves  and  yet  survive,  achieving  your 
end. 

In  his  own  time  a  man  is  always  very 
modern.     Whether  the  seamen  of  three  hun- 
dred years  hence  will  have  the  faculty  of 
119 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

sympathy  it  is  impossible  to  say.  An  in- 
corrigible mankind  hardens  its  heart  in  the 
progress  of  its  own  perf ectability.  How  will 
they  feel  on  seeing  the  illustrations  to  the 
sea  novels  of  our  day,  or  of  our  yesterday? 
It  is  impossible  to  guess.  But  the  seaman 
of  the  last  generation,  brought  into  sym- 
pathy with  the  caravels  of  ancient  time  by 
his  sailing-ship,  their  lineal  descendant,  can- 
not look  upon  those  lumbering  forms  navi- 
gating the  naive  seas  of  ancient  wood-cuts 
without  a  feeling  of  surprise,  of  affectionate 
derision,  envy,  and  admiration.  For  those 
things,  whose  unmanageableness,  even  when 
represented  on  paper,  makes  one  gasp  with  a 
sort  of  amused  horror,  were  manned  by  men 
who  are  his  direct  professional  ancestors. 

No;  the  seamen  of  three  hundred  years 
hence  will  probably  be  neither  touched  nor 
moved  to  derision,  affection,  or  admiration. 
They  will  glance  at  the  photogravures  of  our 
nearly  defunct  sailing-ships  with  a  cold,  in- 
quisitive, and  indifferent  eye.  Our  ships  of 
yesterday  will  stand  to  their  ships  as  no 
lineal  ancestors,  but  as  mere  predecessors 
whose  course  will  have  been  run  and  the 
120 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

race  extinct.  Whatever  craft  he  handles  at 
sea,  the  seaman  of  the  future  shall  be,  not 
our  descendant,  but  only  our  successor. 


And  so  much  depends  upon  the  craft 
which,  made  by  man,  is  one  with  man,  that 
the  sea  shall  wear  for  him  another  aspect. 
I  remember  once  seeing  the  commander — 
officially  the  master,  by  courtesy  the  cap- 
tain— of  a  fine  iron  ship  of  the  old  wool  fleet 
shaking  his  head  at  a  very  pretty  brigantine. 
She  was  bound  the  other  way.  She  was  a 
taut,  trim,  neat  little  craft,  extremely  well 
kept;  and  on  that  serene  evening  when  we 
passed  her  close  she  looked  the  embodiment 
of  coquettish  comfort  on  the  sea.  It  was 
somewhere  near  the  Cape — The  Cape  being, 
of  course,  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  the  Cape 
of  Storms  of  its  Portuguese  discoverer.  And 
whether  it  is  that  the  word  "storm"  should 
not  be  pronounced  upon  the  sea  where  the 
storms  dwell  thickly,  or  because  men  are  shy 
of  confessing  their  good  hopes,  it  has  become 
the  nameless  cape — the  Cape  tout  court.  The 
121 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

other  great  cape  of  the  world,  strangely 
enough,  is  seldom  if  ever  called  a  cape.  We 
say,  "a  voyage  round  the  Horn";  "we 
rounded  the  Horn";  "we  got  a  frightful 
battering  off  the  Horn";  but  rarely  "Cape 
Horn,"  and,  indeed,  with  some  reason,  for 
Cape  Horn  is  as  much  an  island  as  a  cape. 
The  third  stormy  cape  of  the  world,  which 
is  the  Leeuwin,  receives  generally  its  full 
name,  as  if  to  console  its  second-rate  dig- 
nity. These  are  the  capes  that  look  upon 
the  gales. 

The  little  brigantine,  then,  had  doubled 
the  Cape.  Perhaps  she  was  coming  from 
Port  Elizabeth,  from  East  London  —  who 
knows?  It  was  many  years  ago,  but  I  re- 
member well  the  captain  of  the  wool  clipper 
nodding  at  her  with  the  words,  "  Fancy  hav- 
ing to  go  about  the  sea  in  a  thing  like  that!" 

He  was  a  man  brought  up  in  big,  deep- 
water  ships,  and  the  size  of  the  craft  under 
his  feet  was  a  part  of  his  conception  of  the 
sea.  His  own  ship  was  certainly  big  as 
ships  went  then.  He  may  have  thought  of 
the  size  of  his  cabin,  or — unconsciously,  per- 
haps— have  conjured  up  a  vision  of  a  vessel 

122 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

so  small  tossing  among  the  great  seas.  I 
didn't  inquire,  and  to  a  young  second  mate 
the  captain  of  the  little,  pretty  brigantine, 
sitting  astride  a  camp-stool  with  his  chin 
resting  on  his  hands  that  were  crossed  upon 
the  rail,  might  have  appeared  a  minor  king 
among  men.  We  passed  her  within  ear- shot, 
without  a  hail,  reading  each  other's  name 
with  the  naked  eye. 

Some  years  later,  the  second  mate,  the  re- 
cipient of  that  almost  involuntary  mutter, 
could  have  told  his  captain  that  a  man 
brought  up  in  big  ships  may  yet  take  a  pe- 
culiar delight  in  what  we  should  both  then 
have  called  a  small  craft.  Probably  the 
captain  of  the  big  ship  would  not  have  un- 
derstood very  well.  His  answer  would  have 
been  a  gruff,  "Give  me  size,"  as  I  heard  an- 
other man  reply  to  a  remark  praising  the 
handiness  of  a  small  vessel.  It  was  not  a 
love  of  the  grandiose  or  the  prestige  attached 
to  the  command  of  great  tonnage,  for  he 
continued,  with  an  air  of  disgust  and  con- 
tempt, "Why,  you  get  flung  out  of  your 
bunk  as  likely  as  not  in  any  sort  of  heavy 
weather." 

9  123 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

I  don't  know.  I  remember  a  few  nights 
in  my  lifetime,  and  in  a  big  ship,  too  (as  big 
as  they  made  them  then),  when  one  did  not 
get  flung  out  of  one's  bed  simply  because  one 
never  even  attempted  to  get  in;  one  had 
been  made  too  weary,  too  hopeless,  to  try. 
The  expedient  of  turning  your  bedding  out 
on  to  a  damp  floor  and  lying  on  it  there  was 
no  earthly  good,  since  you  could  not  keep 
your  place  or  get  a  second's  rest  in  that  or 
any  other  position.  But  of  the  delight  of 
seeing  a  small  craft  run  bravely  among  the 
great  seas  there  can  be  no  question  to  him 
whose  soul  does  not  dwell  ashore.  Thus  I 
well  remember  a  three  days'  run  got  out  of 
a  little  bark  of  four  hundred  tons  some- 
where between  the  islands  of  St.  Paul  and 
Amsterdam  and  Cape  Otway  on  the  Austra- 
lian coast.  It  was  a  hard,  long  gale,  gray 
clouds  and  green  sea,  heavy  weather  un- 
doubtedly, but  still  what  a  sailor  would  call 
manageable.  Under  two  lower  topsails  and 
a  reefed  foresail  the  bark  seemed  to  race 
with  a  long,  steady  sea  that  did  not  becalm 
her  in  the  troughs.  The  solemn  thundering 
combers  caught  her  up  from  astern,  passed 
124 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

her  with  a  fierce  boiling  up  of  foam  level 
with  the  bulwarks,  swept  on  ahead  with  a 
swish  and  a  roar:  and  the  little  vessel,  dip- 
ping her  jib-boom  into  the  tumbling  froth, 
would  go  on  running  in  a  smooth,  glassy  hol- 
low, a  deep  valley  between  two  ridges  of  the 
sea,  hiding  the  horizon  ahead  and  astern. 
There  was  such  fascination  in  her  pluck, 
nimbleness,  the  continual  exhibition  of  un- 
failing sea -worthiness,  in  the  semblance  of 
courage  and  endurance,  that  I  could  not 
give  up  the  delight  of  watching  her  run 
through  the  three  unforgettable  days  of 
that  gale  which  my  mate  also  delighted  to 
extol  as  "a  famous  shove." 

And  this  is  one  of  those  gales  whose 
memory  in  after  years  returns,  welcome  in 
dignified  austerity,  as  you  remember  with 
pleasure  the  noble  features  of  a  stranger 
with  whom  you  have  crossed  swords  once 
in  knightly  encounter  and  are  never  to  see 
again.  In  this  way  gales  have  their  physi- 
ognomy. You  remember  them  by  your 
own  feelings,  and  no  two  gales  stamp  them- 
selves in  the  same  way  upon  your  emotions. 
Some  cling  to  you  in  woe-begone  misery; 
"5 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

others  come  back  fiercely  and  weirdly,  like 
ghouls  bent  upon  sucking  your  strength 
away;  others,  again,  have  a  catastrophic 
splendor;  some  are  unvenerated  recollec- 
tions, as  of  spiteful  wild -cats  clawing  at 
your  agonized  vitals;  others  are  severe,  like 
a  visitation;  and  one  or  two  rise  up  draped 
and  mysterious,  with  an  aspect  of  ominous 
menace.  In  each  of  them  there  is  a  char- 
acteristic point  at  which  the  whole  feeling 
seems  contained  in  one  single  moment. 
Thus  there  is  a  certain  four  o'clock  in  the 
morning  in  the  confused  roar  of  a  black-and- 
white  world  when  coming  on  deck  to  take 
charge  of  my  watch  I  received  the  instan- 
taneous impression  that  the  ship  could  not 
live  for  another  hour  in  such  a  raging  sea. 

I  wonder  what  became  of  the  men  who 
silently  (you  couldn't  hear  yourself  speak) 
must  have  shared  that  conviction  with  me. 
To  be  left  to  write  about  it  is  not,  perhaps, 
the  most  enviable  fate ;  but  the  point  is  that 
this  impression  resumes  in  its  intensity  the 
whole  recollection  of  days  and  days  of  des- 
perately dangerous  weather.  We  were  then, 
for  reasons  which  it  is  not  worth  while  to 
126 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

specify,  in  the  close  neighborhood  of  Ker- 
guelen  Land ;  and  now,  when  I  open  an  atlas 
and  look  at  the  tiny  dots  on  the  map  of  the 
Southern  Ocean,  I  see,  as  if  engraved  upon 
the  paper,  the  enraged  physiognomy  of  that 
gale. 

Another,  strangely,  recalls  a  silent  man. 
And  yet  it  was  not  din  that  was  wanting ;  in 
fact,  it  was  terrific.  That  one  was  a  gale 
that  came  upon  the  ship  swiftly,  like  a 
pampero,  which  last  is  a  very  sudden  wind 
indeed.  Before  we  knew  very  well  what 
was  coming  all  the  sails  we  had  set  had 
burst;  the  furled  ones  were  blowing  loose, 
ropes  flying,  sea  hissing — it  hissed  tremen- 
dously— wind  howling,  and  the  ship  lying 
on  her  side,  so  that  half  of  the  crew  were 
swimming  and  the  other  half  clawing  des- 
perately at  whatever  came  to  hand,  accord- 
ing to  the  side  of  the  deck  each  man  had 
been  caught  on  by  the  catastrophe,  either  to 
leeward  or  to  windward.  The  shouting  I 
need  not  mention — it  was  the  merest  drop 
in  an  ocean  of  noise — and  yet  the  character 
of  the  gale  seems  contained  in  the  recollec- 
tion of  one  small,  not  particularly  impres- 
127 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

sive,  sallow  man  without  a  cap  and  with  a 
very  still  face.  Captain  Jones — let  us  call 
him  Jones  —  had  been  caught  unawares. 
Two  orders  he  had  given  at  the  first  sign  of 
an  utterly  unforeseen  onset;  after  that  the 
magnitude  of  his  mistake  seemed  to  have 
overwhelmed  him.  We  were  doing  what 
was  needed  and  feasible.  The  ship  behaved 
well.  Of  course,  it  was  some  time  before  we 
could  pause  in  our  fierce  and  laborious  ex- 
ertions; but  all  through  the  work,  the  ex- 
citement, the  uproar,  and  some  dismay,  we 
were  aware  of  this  silent  little  man  at  the 
break  of  the  poop,  perfectly  motionless, 
soundless,  and  often  hidden  from  us  by  the 
drift  of  sprays. 

When  we  officers  clambered  at  last  upon 
the  poop,  he  seemed  to  come  out  of  that 
numbed  composure,  and  shouted  to  us 
down  wind:  "Try  the  pumps."  Afterwards 
he  disappeared.  As  to  the  ship,  I  need  not 
say  that,  although  she  was  presently  swal- 
lowed up  in  one  of  the  blackest  nights  I  can 
remember,  she  did  not  disappear.  In  truth, 
I  don't  fancy  that  there  had  ever  been  much 
danger  of  that,  but  certainly  the  experience 
128 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

was  noisy  and  particularly  distracting— and 
yet  it  is  the  memory  of  a  very  quiet  silence 
that  survives. 


For,  after  all,  a  gale  of  wind,  the  thing  of 
mighty  sound,  is  inarticulate.  It  is  man 
who,  in  a  chance  phrase,  interprets  the  ele- 
mental passion  of  his  enemy.  Thus  there  is 
another  gale  in  my  memory,  a  thing  of  end- 
less, deep,  humming  roar,  moonlight,  and  a 
spoken  sentence. 

It  was  off  that  other  cape  which  is  always 
deprived  of  its  title  as  the  Cape  of  Good 
Hope  is  robbed  of  its  name.  It  was  off  the 
Horn.  For  a  true  expression  of  dishevelled 
wildness  there  is  nothing  like  a  gale  in  the 
bright  moonlight  of  a  high  latitude. 

The  ship,  brought-to  and  bowing  to  enor- 
mous, flashing  seas,  glistened  wet  from  deck 
to  trucks;  her  one  set  sail  stood  out  a  coal- 
black  shape  upon  the  gloomy  blueness  of  the 
air.  I  was  a  youngster  then,  and  suffering 
from  weariness,  cold,  and  imperfect  oil- skins 
which  let  water  in  at  every  seam.  I  craved 
129 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

human  companionship,  and,  coming  off  the 
poop,  took  my  place  by  the  side  of  the  boat- 
swain (a  man  whom  I  did  not  like)  in  a 
comparatively  dry  spot  where  at  worst  we 
had  water  only  up  to  our  knees.  Above  our 
heads  the  explosive  booming  gusts  of  wind 
passed  continuously,  justifying  the  sailor's 
saying,  "It  blows  great  guns."  And  just 
from  that  need  of  human  companionship, 
being  very  close  to  the  man,  I  said,  or 
rather  shouted: 

"Blows  very  hard,  boatswain." 

His  answer  was: 

"Ay,  and  if  it  blows  only  a  little  harder 
things  will  begin  to  go.  I  don't  mind  as 
long  as  everything  holds,  but  when  things 
begin  to  go  it's  bad." 

The  note  of  dread  in  the  shouting  voice, 
the  practical  truth  of  these  words,  heard 
years  ago  from  a  man  I  did  not  like,  have 
stamped  its  peculiar  character  on  that  gale. 

A  look  in  the  eyes  of  a  shipmate,  a  low 
murmur  in  the  most  sheltered  spot  where 
the  watch  on  duty  are  huddled  together,  a 
meaning  moan  from  one  to  the  other  with  a 
glance  at  the  windward  sky,  a  sigh  of  weari- 
130 


The  Character  of  the  Foe 

ness,  a  gesture  of  disgust  passing  into  the 
keeping  of  the  great  wind,  become  part  and 
parcel  of  the  gale.  The  olive  hue  of  hurri- 
cane clouds  presents  an  aspect  peculiarly 
appalling.  The  inky,  ragged  wrack,  flying 
before  a  nor 'west  wind,  makes  you  dizzy 
with  its  headlong  speed  that  depicts  the 
rush  of  the  invisible  air.  A  hard  sou'wester 
startles  you  with  its  close  horizon  and  its 
low,  gray  sky,  as  if  the  world  were  a  dungeon 
wherein  there  is  no  rest  for  body  or  soul. 
And  there  are  black-squalls,  white-squalls, 
thunder-squalls,  and  unexpected  gusts  that 
come  without  a  single  sign  in  the  sky;  and 
of  each  kind  no  one  of  them  resembles  an- 
other. 

There  is  infinite  variety  in  the  gales  of 
wind  at  sea,  and  except  for  the  peculiar, 
terrible,  and  mysterious  moaning  that  may 
be  heard  sometimes  passing  through  the 
roar  of  a  hurricane — except  for  that  unfor- 
gettable sound,  as  if  the  soul  of  the  universe 

f  had  been  goaded  into  a  mournful  groan — it 
is,  after  all,  the  human  voice  that  stamps 

I  the  mark  of  human  consciousness  upon  the 

I  character  of  a  gale. 

131 


Rulers  of   East  and  West 


| HERE  is  no  part  of  the  world 
of  coasts,  continents,  oceans, 
seas,  straits,  capes,  and  islands 
which  is  not  under  the  sway  of 
a  reigning  wind,  the  sovereign 
of  its  typical  weather.  The  wind  rules  the 
aspects  of  the  sky  and  the  action  of  the  sea. 
But  no  wind  rules  unchallenged  his  realm  of 
land  and  water.  As  with  the  kingdoms  of 
the  earth,  there  are  regions  more  turbulent 
than  others.  In  the  middle  belt  of  the  earth 
the  Trade  Winds  reign  supreme,  undisputed, 
like  monarchs  of  long -settled  kingdoms, 
whose  traditional  power,  checking  all  undue 
ambitions,  is  not  so  much  an  exercise  of 
personal  might  as  the  working  of  long-estab- 
lished institutions.  The  inter-tropical  king- 
doms of  the  Trade  Winds  are  favorable  to 
the  ordinary  life  of  a  merchantman.  The 
13? 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

trumpet-call  of  strife  is  seldom  borne  on 
their  wings  to  the  watchful  ears  of  men  on 
the  decks  of  ships.  The  regions  ruled  by 
the  northeast  and  southeast  Trade  Winds 
are  serene.  In  a  southern  -  going  ship, 
bound  out  for  a  long  voyage,  the  passage 
through  their  dominions  is  characterized  by 
a  relaxation  of  strain  and  vigilance  on  the 
part  of  the  seamen.  Those  citizens  of  the 
ocean  feel  sheltered  under  the  aegis  of  an  un- 
contested law,  of  an  undisputed  dynasty. 
There,  indeed,  if  anywhere  on  earth,  the 
weather  may  be  trusted. 

Yet  not  too  implicitly.  Even  in  the  con- 
stitutional realm  of  Trade  Winds,  north  and 
south  of  the  equator,  ships  are  overtaken 
by  strange  disturbances.  Still,  the  easterly 
winds,  and,  generally  speaking,  the  easterly 
weather  all  the  world  over,  is  characterized 
by  regularity  and  persistence. 

As  a  ruler,  the  East  Wind  has  a  remark- 
able stability ;  as  an  invader  of  the  high  lati- 
tudes lying  under  the  tumultuous  sway  of 
his  great  brother,  the  Wind  of  the  West,  he  is 
extremely  difficult  to  dislodge,  by  the  reason 
of  his  cold  craftiness  and  profound  duplicity. 
TS3 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

The  narrow  seas  around  these  isles,  where 
British  admirals  keep  watch  and  ward  upon 
the  marches  of  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  are  sub- 
ject to  the  turbulent  sway  of  the  West 
Wind.  Call  it  northwest  or  southwest,  it  is 
all  one — a  different  phase  of  the  same  char- 
acter, a  changed  expression  on  the  same 
face.  In  the  orientation  of  the  winds  that 
rule  the  seas,  the  north  and  south  directions 
are  of  no  importance.  There  are  no  North 
and  South  Winds  of  any  account  upon  this 
earth.  The  North  and  South  Winds  are  but 
small  princes  in  the  dynasties  that  make 
peace  and  war  upon  the  sea.  They  never 
assert  themselves  upon  a  vast  stage.  They 
depend  upon  local  causes — the  configuration 
of  coasts,  the  shapes  of  straits,  the  accidents 
of  bold  promontories  round  which  they  play 
their  little  part.  In  the  polity  of  winds,  as 
among  the  tribes  of  the  earth,  the  real 
struggle  lies  between  East  and  West. 


The  West  Wind  reigns  over  the  seas  sur- 
rounding the  coasts  of  these  kingdoms;  and 
i34 


Rulers  of   East  and  West 

from  the  gateways  of  the  channels,  from 
promontories  as  if  from  watch-towers,  from 
estuaries  of  rivers  as  if  from  postern-gates, 
from  passageways,  inlets,  straits,  firths,  the 
garrison  of  the  isle  and  the  crews  of  the  ships 
going  and  returning  look  to  the  westward  to 
judge  by  the  varied  splendors  of  his  sunset 
mantle  the  mood  of  that  arbitrary  ruler. 
The  end  of  the 'day  is  the  time  to  gaze  at 
the  kingly  face  of  the  Westerly  Weather, 
who  is  the  arbiter  of  ships'  destinies.  Be- 
nignant and  splendid,  or  splendid  and  sin- 
ister, the  western  sky  reflects  the  hidden 
purposes  of  the  royal  mind.  Clothed  in  a 
mantle  of  dazzling  gold  or  draped  in  rags  of 
black  clouds  like  a  beggar,  the  might  of  the 
Westerly  Wind  sits  enthroned  upon  the 
western  horizon  with  the  whole  North  At- 
lantic as  a  footstool  for  his  feet  and  the  first 
twinkling  stars  making  a  diadem  for  his 
brow.  Then  the  seamen,  attentive  courtiers 
of  the  weather,  think  of  regulating  the  con- 
duct of  their  ships  by  the  mood  of  the 
master.  The  West  Wind  is  too  great  a 
king  to  be  a  dissembler:  he  is  no  calculator 
plotting  deep  schemes  in  a  sombre  heart;  he 
i3S 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

is  too  strong  for  small  artifices ;  there  is  pas- 
sion in  all  his  moods,  even  in  the  soft  mood 
of  his  serene  days,  in  the  grace  of  his  blue 
sky  whose  immense  and  unfathomable  ten- 
derness reflected  in  the  mirror  of  the  sea 
embraces,  possesses,  lulls  to  sleep  the  ships 
with  white  sails.  He  is  all  things  to  all 
oceans;  he  is  like  a  poet  seated  upon 
a  throne  —  magnificent,  simple,  barbarous, 
pensive,  generous,  impulsive,  changeable, 
unfathomable  —  but,  when  you  understand 
him,  always  the  same.  Some  of  his  sunsets 
are  like  pageants  devised  for  the  delight  of 
the  multitude,  when  all  the  gems  of  the 
royal  treasure-house  are  displayed  above 
the  sea.  Others  are  like  the  opening  of  his 
royal  confidence,  tinged  with  thoughts  of 
sadness  and  compassion  in  a  melancholy 
splendor  meditating  upon  the  short-lived 
peace  of  the  sea.  And  I  have  seen  him  put 
the  pent-up  anger  of  his  heart  into  the  aspect 
of  the  inaccessible  sun,  and  cause  it  to  glare 
fiercely  like  the  eye  of  an  implacable  auto- 
crat out  of  a  pale  and  frightened  sky. 

He  is  the  war-lord  who  sends  his  bat- 
talions of  Atlantic  rollers  to  the  assault  of 
136 


Rulers   of  East  and  West 

our  shores.  The  compelling  voice  of  the 
West  Wind  musters  up  to  his  service  all  the 
might  of  the  sea.  At  the  bidding  of  the 
West  Wind  there  arises  a  great  commotion 
in  the  sky  above  these  islands,  and  a  great 
rush  of  waters  falls  upon  our  shores.  The 
sky  of  the  westerly  weather  is  full  of  flying 
clouds,  of  great  big  white  clouds  coming 
thicker  and  thicker  till  they  seem  to  stand 
welded  into  a  solid  canopy,  upon  whose 
gray  face  the  lower  wrack  of  the  gale,  thin, 
black,  and  angry  looking,  flies  past  with  ver- 
tiginous speed.  Denser  and  denser  grows 
this  dome  of  vapors,  descending  lower  and 
lower  upon  the  sea,  narrowing  the  horizon 
around  the  ship.  And  the  characteristic 
aspect  of  westerly  weather,  the  thick,  gray, 
smoky  and  sinister  tone  sets  in,  circum- 
scribing the  view  of  the  men,  drenching 
their  bodies,  oppressing  their  souls,  taking 
their  breath  away  with  booming  gusts,  deaf- 
ening, blinding,  driving,  rushing  them  on- 
ward in  a  swaying  ship  towards  our  coasts 
lost  in  mists  and  rain. 

The  caprice  of  the  winds,  like  the  wilful- 
ness of  men,  is  fraught  with  the  disastrous 
127 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

consequences  of  self-indulgence.  Long  an- 
ger, the  sense  of  his  uncontrolled  power, 
spoils  the  frank  and  generous  nature  of  the 
West  Wind.  It  is  as  if  his  heart  were  cor- 
rupted by  a  malevolent  and  brooding  ran- 
cour. He  devastates  his  own  kingdom  in 
the  wantonness  of  his  force.  Southwest  is 
the  quarter  of  the  heavens  where  he  pre- 
sents his  darkened  brow.  He  breathes  his 
rage  in  terrific  squalls,  and  overwhelms  his 
realm  with  an  inexhaustible  welter  of  clouds. 
He  strews  the  seeds  of  anxiety  upon  the 
decks  of  scudding  ships,  makes  the  foam- 
stripped  ocean  look  old,  and  sprinkles  with 
gray  hairs  the  heads  of  ship-masters  in  the 
homeward-bound  ships  running  for  the  Chan- 
nel. The  Westerly  Wind  asserting  his  sway 
from  the  southwest  quarter  is  often  like  a 
monarch  gone  mad,  driving  forth  with  wild 
imprecations  the  most  faithful  of  his  court- 
iers to  shipwreck,  disaster,  and  death. 

The  southwesterly  weather  is  the  thick 
weather  par  excellence.  It  is  not  the  thick- 
ness of  the  fog;  it  is  rather  a  contraction  of 
the  horizon,  a  mysterious  veiling  of  the 
shores  with  clouds  that  seem  to  make  a  low- 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

vaulted  dungeon  around  the  running  ship. 
It  is  not  blindness;  it  is  a  shortening  of  the 
sight.  The  West  Wind  does  not  say  to  the 
seaman,  "You  shall  be  blind";  it  restricts 
merely  the  range  of  his  vision  and  raises  the 
dread  of  land  within  his  breast.  It  makes 
of  him  a  man  robbed  of  half  his  force,  of 
half  his  efficiency.  Many  times  in  my  life, 
standing  in  long  sea-boots  and  streaming  oil- 
skins at  the  elbow  of  my  commander  on  the 
poop  of  a  homeward-bound  ship  making  for 
the  Channel,  and  gazing  ahead  into  the  gray 
and  tormented  waste,  I  have  heard  a  weary 
sigh  shape  itself  into  a  studiously  casual 
comment : 

"Can't  see  very  far  in  this  weather." 

And  have  made  answer  in  the  same  low, 
perfunctory  tone : 

"No,  sir." 

It  would  be  merely  the  instinctive  voicing 
of  an  ever-present  thought  associated  closely 
with  the  consciousness  of  the  land  some- 
where ahead  and  of  the  great  speed  of  the 
ship.  Fair  wind,  fair  wind!  Who  would 
dare  to  grumble  at  a  fair  wind?  It  was  a 
favor  of  the  Western  King,  who'  rules  mas- 
139 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

terfully  the  North  Atlantic  from  the  latitude 
of  the  Azores  to  the  latitude  of  Cape  Fare- 
well. A  famous  shove  this  to  end  a  good 
passage  with;  and  yet,  somehow,  one  could 
not  muster  upon  one's  lips  the  smile  of 
a  courtier's  gratitude.  This  favor  was  dis- 
pensed to  you  from  under  an  overbearing 
scowl,  which  is  the  true  expression  of  the 
great  autocrat  when  he  has  made  up  his 
mind  to  give  a  battering  to  some  ships  and 
to  hunt  certain  others  home  in  one  breath 
of  cruelty  and  benevolence,  equally  dis- 
tracting. 

"No,  sir.     Can't  see  very  far." 

Thus  would  the  mate's  voice  repeat  the 
thought  of  the  master,  both  gazing  ahead, 
while  under  their  feet  the  ship  rushes  at 
some  twelve  knots  in  the  direction  of  the  lee 
shore ;  and  only  a  couple  of  miles  in  front  of 
her  swinging  and  dripping  jib-boom,  carried 
naked  with  an  upward  slant  like  a  spear,  a 
gray  horizon  closes  the  view  with  a  multi- 
tude of  waves  surging  upward  violently  as 
if  to  strike  at  the  stooping  clouds. 

Awful  and  threatening  scowls  darken  the 
face  of  the  West  Wind  in  his  clouded,  south- 
140 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

west  mood ;  and  from  the  King's  throne-hall 
in  the  western  board  stronger  gusts  reach 
you,  like  the  fierce  shouts  of  raving  fury  to 
which  only  the  gloomy  grandeur  of  the 
scene  imparts  a  saving  dignity.  A  shower 
pelts  the  deck  and  the  sails  of  the  ship  as  if 
flung  with  a  scream  by  an  angry  hand ;  and 
when  the  night  closes  in,  the  night  of  a 
southwesterly  gale,  it  seems  more  hopeless 
than  the  shade  of  Hades.  The  southwesterly 
mood  of  the  great  West  Wind  is  a  lightless 
mood,  without  sun,  moon,  or  stars,  with  no 
gleam  of  light  but  the  phosphorescent  flashes 
of  the  great  sheets  of  foam  that,  boiling  up 
on  each  side  of  the  ship,  fling  bluish  gleams 
upon  her  dark  and  narrow  hull,  rolling  as 
she  runs,  chased  by  enormous  seas,  dis- 
tracted in  the  tumult. 

There  are  some  bad  nights  in  the  king- 
dom of  the  West  Wind  for  homeward- 
bound  ships  making  for  the  Channel;  and 
the  days  of  wrath  dawn  upon  them  colorless 
and  vague  like  the  timid  turning  up  of  in- 
visible lights  upon  the  scene  of  a  tyranni- 
cal and  passionate  outbreak,  awful  in  the 
monotony  of  its  method  and  the  increasing 
141 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

strength  of  its  violence.  It  is  the  same 
wind,  the  same  clouds,  the  same  wildly- 
racing  seas,  the  same  thick  horizon  around 
the  ship.  Only  the  wind  is  stronger,  the 
clouds  seem  denser  and  more  overwhelm- 
ing, the  waves  appear  to  have  grown  bigger 
and  more  threatening  during  the  night. 
The  hours,  wThose  minutes  are  marked  by 
the  crash  of  the  breaking  seas,  slip  by  with 
the  screaming,  pelting  squalls  overtaking 
the  ship  as  she  runs  on  and  on  with  darkened 
canvas,  with  streaming  spars  and  dripping 
ropes.  The  downpours  thicken.  Preceding 
each  shower  a  mysterious  gloom,  like  the 
passage  of  a  shadow  above  the  firmament  of 
gray  clouds,  filters  down  upon  the  ship. 
Now  and  then  the  rain  pours  upon  your 
head  in  streams  as  if  from  spouts.  It  seems 
as  if  your  ship  were  going  to  be  drowned  be- 
fore she  sank,  as  if  all  atmosphere  had 
turned  to  water.  You  gasp,  you  splutter, 
you  are  blinded  and  deafened,  you  are  sub- 
merged, obliterated,  dissolved,  annihilated, 
streaming  all  over  as  if  your  limbs,  too,  had 
turned  to  water.  And  every  nerve  on  the 
alert  you  watch  for  the  clearing-up  mood  of 
142 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

the  Western  King,  that  shall  come  with  a 
shift  of  wind  as  likely  as  not  to  whip  all  the 
three  masts  out  of  your  ship  in  the  twinkling 
of  an  eye. 


Heralded  by  the  increasing  fierceness  of 
the  squalls,  sometimes  by  a  faint  flash  of 
lightning  like  the  signal  of  a  lighted  torch 
waved  far  away  behind  the  clouds,  the  shift 
of  wind  comes  at  last,  the  crucial  moment  of 
the  change  from  the  brooding  and  veiled 
violence  of  the  southwest  gale  to  the  spark- 
ling, flashing,  cutting,  clear-eyed  anger  of 
the  King's  northwesterly  mood.  You  be- 
hold another  phase  of  his  passion,  a  fury 
bejewelled  with  stars,  mayhap  bearing  the 
crescent  of  the  moon  on  its  brow,  shaking 
the  last  vestiges  of  its  torn  cloud-mantle  in 
inky-black  squalls,  with  hail  and  sleet  de- 
scending like  showers  of  crystals  and  pearls, 
bounding  off  the  spars,  drumming  on  the 
sails,  pattering  on  the  oil-ski'n  coats,  whiten- 
ing the  decks  of  homeward-bound  ships. 
Faint,  ruddy  flashes  of  lightning  flicker  in 
143 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

the  starlight  upon  her  mast-heads.  A  chilly 
blast  hums  in  the  taut  rigging,  causing  the 
ship  to  tremble  to  her  very  keel,  and  the 
soaked  men  on  her  decks  to  shiver  in  their 
wet  clothes  to  the  very  marrow  of  their 
bones.  Before  one  squall  has  flown  over  to 
sink  in  the  eastern  board,  the  edge  of  an- 
other peeps  up  already  above  the  western 
horizon,  racing  up  swift,  shapeless,  like  a 
black  bag  full  of  frozen  water  ready  to  burst 
over  your  devoted  head.  The  temper  of 
the  ruler  of  the  ocean  has  changed.  Each 
gust  of  the  clouded  mood  that  seemed 
warmed  by  the  heat  of  a  heart  flaming  with 
anger  has  its  counterpart  in  the  chilly  blasts 
that  seem  blown  from  a  breast  turned  to  ice 
with  a  sudden  revulsion  of  feeling.  Instead 
of  blinding  your  eyes  and  crushing  your  soul 
with  a  terrible  apparatus  of  cloud  and  mists 
and  seas  and  rain,  the  King  of  the  West 
turns  his  power  to  contemptuous  pelting  of 
your  back  with  icicles,  to  making  your 
weary  eyes  water  as  if  in  grief,  and  your 
worn-out  carcass  quake  pitifully.  But  each 
mood  of  the  great  autocrat  has  its  own 
greatness,  and  each  is  hard  to  bear.  Only 
144 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

the  northwest  phase  of  that  mighty  display 
is  not  demoralizing  to  the  same  extent,  be- 
cause between  the  hail  and  sleet  squalls  of  a 
northwesterly  gale  one  can  see  a  long  way 
ahead. 

To  see!  to  see! — this  is  the  craving  of  the 
sailor,  as  of  the  rest  of  blind  humanity.  To 
have  his  path  made  clear  for  him  is  the  as- 
piration of  every  human  being  in  our  be- 
clouded and  tempestuous  existence.  I  have 
heard  a  reserved,  silent  man,  with  no  nerves 
to  speak  of,  after  three  days  of  hard  running 
in  thick  southwesterly  weather,  burst  out, 
passionately:  "I  wish  to  God  we  could  get 
sight  of  something!" 

We  had  just  gone  down  below  for  a  mo- 
ment to  commune  in  a  battened-down  cabin, 
with  a  large  white  chart  lying  limp  and 
damp  upon  a  cold  and  clammy  table  under 
the  light  of  a  smoky  lamp.  Sprawling  over 
that  seaman's  silent  and  trusted  adviser, 
with  one  elbow  upon  the  coast  of  Africa  and 
the  other  planted  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Cape  Hatteras  (it  was  a  general  track-chart 
of  the  North  Atlantic) ,  my  skipper  lifted  his 
rugged*  hairy  face,  and  glared  at  me  in  a 
145 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

half  -  exasperated,  half  -  appealing  way.  We 
had  seen  no  sun,  moon,  or  stars  for  some- 
thing like  seven  days.  By  the  effect  of  the 
West  Wind's  wrath  the  celestial  bodies  had 
gone  into  hiding  for  a  week  or  more,  and  the 
last  three  days  had  seen  the  force  of  a  south- 
west gale  grow  from  fresh,  through  strong, 
to  heavy,  as  the  entries  in  my  log-book 
could  testify.  Then  we  separated,  he  to  go 
on  deck  again,  in  obedience  to  that  mysteri- 
ous call  that  seems  to  sound  forever  in  a 
ship-master's  ears,  I  to  stagger  into  my 
cabin  with  some  vague  notion  of  putting 
down  the  words  "Very  heavy  weather' '  in 
a  log-book  not  quite  written  up  to  date. 
But  I  gave  it  up,  and  crawled  into  my  bunk 
instead,  boots  and  hat  on,  all  standing  (it 
did  not  matter ;  everything  was  soaking  wet, 
a  heavy  sea  having  burst  the  poop  skylights 
the  night  before),  to  remain  in  a  night- 
marish state  between  waking  and  sleeping 
for  a  couple  of  hours  of  so-called  rest. 

The    southwesterly    mood    of    the    West 
Wind  is  an  enemy  of  sleep,  and  even  of  a 
recumbent  position,  in  the  responsible  offi- 
cers of  a  ship.     After  two  hours  of  futile, 
146 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

light-headed,  inconsequent  thinking  upon 
all  things  under  heaven  in  that  dark,  dank, 
wet  and  devastated  cabin,  I  arose  suddenly 
and  staggered  up  on  deck.  The  autocrat  of 
the  North  Atlantic  was  still  oppressing  his 
kingdom  and  its  outlying  dependencies,  even 
as  far  as  the  Bay  of  Biscay,  in  the  dismal 
secrecy  of  thick,  very  thick,  weather.  The 
force  of  the  wTind,  though  we  were  running 
before  it  at  the  rate  of  some  ten  knots  an 
hour,  was  so  great  that  it  drove  me  with  a 
steady  push  to  the  front  of  the  poop,  where 
my  commander  was  holding  on. 

"What  do  you  think  of  it?"  he  addressed 
me  in  an  interrogative  yell. 

What  I  really  thought  was  that  we  both 
had  had  just  about  enough  of  it.  The  man- 
ner in  which  the  great  West  Wind  chooses 
at  times  to  administer  his  possessions  does 
not  commend  itself  to  a  person  of  peaceful 
and  law-abiding  disposition,  inclined  to 
draw  distinctions  between  right  and  wrong 
in  the  face  of  every  force,  whose  standard, 
naturally,  is  that  of  might  alone.  But,  of 
course,  I  said  nothing.  For  a  man  caught, 
as  it  were,  between  his  skipper  and  the 
i47 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

great  West  Wind  silence  is  the  safest  sort  of 
diplomacy.  Moreover,  I  knew  my  skipper. 
He  did  not  want  to  know  what  I  thought. 
Ship-masters  hanging  on  a  breath  before  the 
thrones  of  the  winds  ruling  the  seas  have 
their  psychology,  whose  workings  are  as  im- 
portant to  the  ship  and  those  on  board  of 
her  as  the  changing  moods  of  the  weather. 
The  man,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  under  no  cir- 
cumstances, ever  cared  a  brass  farthing  for 
what  I  or  anybody  else  in  his  ship  thought. 
He  had  had  just  about  enough  of  it,  I 
guessed,  and  what  he  was  at  really  was  a 
process  of  fishing  for  a  suggestion.  It  was 
the  pride  of  his  life  that  he  had  never  wasted 
a  chance,  no  matter  how  boisterous,  threat- 
ening, and  dangerous,  of  a  fair  wind.  Like 
men  racing  blindfold  for  a  gap  in  a  hedge, 
we  were  finishing  a  splendidly  quick  passage 
from  the  antipodes,  with  a  tremendous  rush 
for  the  Channel  in  as  thick  a  weather  as  any 
I  can  remember,  but  his  psychology  did  not 
permit  him  to  bring  the  ship  to  with  a  fair 
wind  blowing — at  least  not  on  his  own  in- 
itiative. And  yet  he  felt  that  very  soon  in- 
deed something  would  have  to  be  done.  He 
148 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

wanted  the  suggestion  to  come  from  me,  so 
that  later  on,  when  the  trouble  was  over,  he 
could  argue  this  point  with  his  own  uncom- 
promising spirit,  laying  the  blame  upon  my 
shoulders.  I  must  render  him  the  justice 
that  this  sort  of  pride  was  his  only  weakness. 

But  he  got  no  suggestion  from  me.  I  un- 
derstood his  psychology.  Besides,  I  had 
my  own  stock  of  weaknesses  at  the  time  (it 
is  a  different  one  now),  and  among  them 
was  the  conceit  of  being  remarkably  well  up 
in  the  psychology  of  the  Westerly  Weather. 
I  believed — not  to  mince  matters — that  I 
had  a  genius  for  reading  the  mind  of  the 
great  ruler  of  high  latitudes.  I  fancied  I 
could  discern  already  the  coming  of  a  change 
in  his  royal  mood.     And  all  I  said  was : 

1  'The  weather  shall  clear  up  with  the  shift 
of  wind." 

"Anybody  knows  that  much,"  he  snapped 
at  me,  at  the  highest  pitch  of  his  voice. 

"I  mean  before  dark,"  I  cried. 

This  was  all  the  opening  he  ever  got  from 
me.     The  eagerness  with  which  he  seized 
upon  it  gave  me  the  measure  of  the  anxiety 
he  had  been  laboring  under. 
149 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

"Very  well,"  he  shouted,  with  an  affecta- 
tion of  impatience,  as  if  giving  way  to  long 
entreaties.  ' '  All  right.  If  we  don't  get  a  shift 
by  then  we'll  take  that  foresail  off  her  and 
put  her  head  under  the  wing  for  the  night." 

I  was  struck  by  the  picturesque  character 
of  the  phrase  as  applied  to  a:  ship  brought-to 
in  order  to  ride  out  a  gale  with  wave  after 
wave  passing  under  her  breast.  I  could  see 
her  resting  in  the  tumult  of  the  elements  like 
a  sea-bird  sleeping  in  wild  weather  upon  the 
raging  waters  with  its  head  tucked  under  its 
wing.  In  imaginative  force,  in  true  feeling, 
this  is  one  of  the  most  expressive  sentences 
I  have  ever  heard  on  human  lips.  But  as 
to  taking  the  foresail  off  that  ship  before  we 
put  her  head  under  her  wing,  I  had  my 
grave  doubts.  They  were  justified.  That 
long  -  enduring  piece  of  canvas  was  confis- 
cated by  the  arbitrary  decree  of  the  West 
Wind,  to  whom  belong  the  lives  of  men  and 
the  contrivances  of  their  hands  within  the 
limits  of  his  kingdom.  With  the  sound  of  a 
faint  explosion  it  vanished  into  the  thick 
weather  bodily,  leaving  behind  of  its  stout 
substance  not  so  much  as  one  solitary  strip 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

big  enough  to  be  picked  into  a  handful  of 
lint  for,  say,  a  wounded  elephant.  Torn  out 
of  its  bolt-ropes,  it  faded  like  a  whiff  of 
smoke  in  the  smoky  drift  of  clouds  shattered 
and  torn  by  the  shift  of  wind.  For  the  shift 
of  wind  had  come.  The  unveiled,  low  sun 
glared  angrily  from  a  chaotic  sky  upon  a 
confused  and  tremendous  sea  dashing  itself 
upon  a  coast.  -We  recognized  the  headland, 
and  looked  at  each  other  in  the  silence  of 
dumb  wonder.  Without  knowing  it  in  the 
least,  we  had  run  up  alongside  the  Isle  of 
Wight,  and  that  tower,  tinged  a  faint  even- 
ing red  in  the  salt  wind-haze,  was  the  light- 
house on  St.  Catherine's  Point. 

My  skipper  recovered  first  from  his  as- 
tonishment. His  bulging  eyes  sank  back 
gradually  into  their  orbits.  His  psychology, 
taking  it  all  round,  was  really  very  credit- 
able for  an  average  sailor.  He  had  been 
spared  the  humiliation  of  laying  his  ship  to 
with  a  fair  wind;  and  at  once  that  man,  of 
an  open  and  truthful  nature,  spoke  up  in 
perfect  good  faith,  rubbing  together  his 
brown,  hairy  hands — the  hands  of  a  master 
craftsman  upon  the  sea: 
*$* 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

"Humph!  that's  just  about  where  I  reck- 
oned we  had  got  to." 

The  transparency  and  ingenuousness,  in 
a  way,  of  that  delusion,  the  airy  tone,  the 
hint  of  already  growing  pride,  were  perfectly 
delicious.  But,  in  truth,  this  was  one  of  the 
greatest  surprises  ever  sprung  by  the  clear- 
ing up  mood  of  the  West  Wind  upon  one  of 
the  most  accomplished  of  his  courtiers. 


The  winds  of  North  and  South  are,  as  I 
have  said,  but  small  princes  among  the 
powers  of  the  sea.  They  have  no  territory 
of  their  own;  they  are  not  reigning  winds 
anywhere.  Yet  it  is  from  their  houses  that 
the  reigning  dynasties  which  have  shared 
between  them  the  waters  of  the  earth  are 
sprung.  All  the  weather  of  the  world  is 
based  upon  the  contest  of  the  polar  and 
equatorial  strains  of  that  tyrannous  race. 
The  West  Wind  is  the  greatest  king.  The 
East  rules  between  the  tropics.  They  have 
shared  each  ocean  between  them.  Each  has 
his  genius  of  supreme  rule.  The  King  of  the 
152 


Rulers  of   East  and  West 

West  never  intrudes  upon  the  recognized 
dominion  of  his  kingly  brother.  He  is  a 
barbarian,  of  a  northern  type.  Violent 
without  craftiness  and  furious  without  mal- 
ice, one  may  imagine  him  seated  masterfully, 
with  a  double-edged  sword  on  his  knees, 
upon  the  painted  and  gilt  clouds  of  the  sun- 
set, bowing  his  shock  head  of  golden  locks, 
a  flaming  beard  over  his  breast,  imposing, 
colossal,  mighty  limbed,  with  a  thundering 
voice,  distended  cheeks,  and  fierce  blue  eyes, 
urging  the  speed  of  his  gales.  The  other, 
the  East  King,  the  king  of  blood-red  sun- 
rises, I  represent  to  myself  as  a  spare  South- 
erner with  clear-cut  features,  black-browed 
and  dark-eyed,  gray-robed,  upright  in  sun- 
shine, resting  a  smooth-shaven  cheek  in  the 
palm  of  his  hand,  impenetrable,  secret,  full 
of  wiles,  fine  drawn,  keen — meditating  ag- 
gressions. 

The  West  Wind  keeps  faith  with  his 
brother,  the  King  of  the  Easterly  Weather. 
"What  we  have  divided  we  have  divided/' 
he  seems  to  say  in  his  gruff  voice,  this  ruler 
without  guile,  who  hurls  as  if  in  sport  enor- 
mous masses  of  cloud  across  the  sky,  and 
i53 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

flings  the  great  waves  of  the  Atlantic  clear 
across  from  the  shores  of  the  New  World 
upon  the  hoary  headlands  of  Old  Europe, 
which  harbors  more  kings  and  rulers  upon 
its  seamed  and  furrowed  body  than  all  the 
oceans  of  the  world  together.  "What  we 
have  divided  we  have  divided;  and  if  no 
rest  and  peace  in  this  world  have  fallen  to 
my  share,  leave  me  alone.  Let  me  play  at 
quoits  with  cyclonic  gales,  flinging  the  disks 
of  spinning  cloud  and  whirling  air  from  one 
end  of  my  dismal  kingdom  to  the  other: 
over  the  Great  Banks,  along  the  edges  of 
pack-ice — this  one  with  true  aim  right  into 
the  bight  of  the  Bay  of  Biscay,  that  other 
upon  the  fiords  of  Norway,  across  the  North 
Sea  where  the  fishermen  of  many  nations 
look  watchfully  into  my  angry  eye.  This  is 
the  time  of  kingly  sport." 

And  the  royal  master  of  high  latitudes 
sighs  mightily,  with  the  sinking  sun  upon 
iiis  breast  and  the  double-edged  sword  upon 
his  knees,  as  if  wearied  by  the  innumerable 
centuries  of  a  strenuous  rule  and  saddened 
by  the  unchangeable  aspect  of  the  ocean 
under  his  feet — by  the  endless  vista  of  future 
*5* 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

ages  where  the  work  of  sowing  the  wind  and 
reaping  the  whirlwind  shall  go  on  and  on  till 
his  realm  of  living  waters  becomes  a  frozen 
and  motionless  ocean.  But  the  other,  crafty 
and  unmoved,  nursing  his  shaven  chin  be- 
tween the  thumb  and  forefinger  of  his  slim 
and  treacherous  hand,  thinks  deep  within 
his  heart  full  of  guile:  "Aha!  our  brother  of 
the  West  has  fallen  into  the  mood  of  kingly 
melancholy.  He  is  tired  of  playing  with  cir- 
cular gales,  and  blowing  great  guns,  and  un- 
rolling thick  streamers  of  fog  in  childish 
sport  at  the  cost  of  his  own  poor,  miserable 
subjects.  Their  fate  is  most  pitiful.  Let 
us  make  a  foray  upon  the  dominions  of  that 
noisy  barbarian,  a  great  raid  from  Finisterre 
to  Hatteras,  catching  his  fishermen  un- 
awares, baffling  the  fleets  that  trust  to  his 
power,  and  shooting  sly  arrows  into  the 
livers  of  men  who  court  his  good  graces. 
He  is,  indeed,  a  worthless  fellow."  And 
forthwith,  while  the  West  Wind  meditates 
upon  the  vanity  of  his  irresistible  might,  the 
thing  is  done,  and  the  Easterly  Weather  sets 
in  upon  the  North  Atlantic. 

The  prevailing  weather  of  the  North  At- 
i55 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

lantic  is  typical  of  the  way  in  which  the 
West  Wind  rules  his  realm  on  which  the  sun 
never  sets.  North  Atlantic  is  the  heart  of  a 
great  empire.  It  is  the  part  of  the  West 
Wind's  dominions  most  thickly  populated 
with  generations  of  fine  ships  and  hardy 
men.  Heroic  deeds  and  adventurous  ex- 
ploits have  been  performed  there,  within  the 
very  stronghold  of  his  sway.  The  best 
sailors  in  the  world  have  been  born  and  bred 
under  the  shadow  of  his  sceptre,  learning  to 
manage  their  ships  with  skill  and  audacity 
before  the  steps  of  his  stormy  throne. 
Reckless  adventurers,  toiling  fishermen,  ad- 
mirals as  wise  and  brave  as  the  world  has 
ever  known,  have  waited  upon  the  signs  of 
his  westerly  sky.  Fleets  of  victorious  ships 
have  hung  upon  his  breath.  He  has  tossed 
in  his  hand  squadrons  of  war-scarred  three- 
deckers,  and  shredded  out  in  mere  sport  the 
bunting  of  flags  hallowed  in  the  traditions 
of  honor  and  glory.  He  is  a  good  friend 
and  a  dangerous  enemy,  without  mercy  to 
unseaworthy  ships  and  faint-hearted  sea- 
men. In  his  kingly  way  he  has  taken  but 
little  account  of  lives  sacrificed  to  his  im- 
*5* 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

pulsive  policy;  he  is  a  king  with  a  double- 
edged  sword  bared  in  his  right  hand.  The 
East  Wind,  an  interloper  in  the  dominions 
of  Westerly  Weather,  is  an  impassive-faced 
tyrant  with  a  sharp  poniard  held  behind  his 
back  for  a  treacherous  stab. 

In  his  forays  into  the  North  Atlantic  the 
East  Wind  behaves  like  a  subtle  and  cruel 
adventurer  without  a  notion  of  honor  or  fair 
play.  Veiling  his  clear-cut,  lean  face  in  a 
thin  layer  of  a  hard,  high  cloud,  I  have  seen 
him,  like  a  wizened  robber  sheik  of  the  sea, 
hold  up  large  caravans  of  ships  to  the  num- 
ber of  three  hundred  or  more  at  the  very 
gates  of  the  English  Channel.  And  the 
worst  of  it  was  that  there  was  no  ransom 
that  we  could  pay  to  satisfy  his  avidity ;  for 
whatever  evil  is  wrought  by  the  raiding 
East  Wind,  it  is  done  only  to  spite  his 
kingly  brother  of  the  West.  We  gazed 
helplessly  at  the  systematic,  cold,  gray- 
eyed  obstinacy  of  the  Easterly  Weather, 
while  short  rations  became  the  order  of  the 
day,  and  the  pinch  of  hunger  under  the 
breast-bone  grew  familiar  to  every  sailor  in 
that  held-up  fleet.  Every  day  added  to  our 
i57 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

numbers.  In  knots  and  groups  and  strag- 
gling parties  we  flung  to  and  fro  before  the 
closed  gate.  And  meantime  the  eastward- 
bound  ships  passed,  running  through  our 
humiliated  ranks  under  all  the  canvas  they 
could  show.  It  is  my  idea  that  the  Easterly 
Wind  helps  the  ships  away  from  home  in 
the  wicked  hope  that  they  shall  all  come  to 
an  untimely  end  and  be  heard  of  no  more. 
For  six  weeks  did  the  robber  sheik  hold  the 
trade  route  of  the  earth,  while  our  liege  lord, 
the  West  Wind,  slept  profoundly  like  a  tired 
Titan,  or  else  remained  lost  in  a  mood  of 
idle  sadness  known  only  to  frank  natures. 
All  was  still  to  the  westward;  we  looked  in 
vain  towards  his  stronghold:  the  King 
slumbered  on  so  deeply  that  he  let  his  for- 
aging brother  steal  the  very  mantle  of  gold- 
lined  purple  clouds  from  his  bowed  shoulders. 
What  had  become  of  the  dazzling  hoard  of 
royal  jewels  exhibited  at  every  close  of  day? 
Gone,  disappeared,  extinguished,  carried  off 
without  leaving  a  single  gold  band  or  the 
flash  of  a  single  sunbeam  in  the  evening 
sky!  Day  after  day,  through  a  cold  streak 
of  heavens  as  bare  and  poor  as  the  inside  of 
i53 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

a  rifled  safe,  a  rayless  and  despoiled  sun 
would  slink  shamefacedly,  without  pomp  or 
show,  to  hide  in  haste  under  the  waters. 
And  still  the  King  slept  on,  or  mourned  the 
vanity  of  his  might  and  his  power,  while  the 
thin-lipped  intruder  put  the  impress  of  his 
cold  and  implacable  spirit  upon  the  sky  and 
sea.  With  every  daybreak  the  rising  sun 
had  to  wade  through  a  crimson  stream,  lu- 
minous and  sinister,  like  the  spilled  blood  of 
celestial  bodies  murdered  during  the  night. 

In  this  particular  instance  the  mean  in- 
terloper held  the  road  for  some  six  weeks 
on  end,  establishing  his  particular  adminis- 
trative methods  over  the  best  part  of  the 
North  Atlantic.  It  looked  as  if  the  Easterly 
Weather  had  come  to  stay  forever,  or,  at 
least,  till  we  had  all  starved  to  death  in  the 
held-up  fleet — starved  within  sight,  as  it 
were,  of  plenty,  within  touch,  almost,  of  the 
bountiful  heart  of  the  Empire.  There  we 
were,  dotting  with  our  white,  dry  sails  the 
hard  blueness  of  the  deep  sea.  There  we 
were,  a  growing  company  of  ships,  each 
with  her  burden  of  grain,  of  timber,  of  wool, 
of  hides,  and  even  of  oranges,  for  we  had 


The  Mirror  of   the  Sea 

one  or  two  belated  fruit  schooners  in  com- 
pany. There  we  were,  in  that  memorable 
spring  of  a  certain  year  in  the  late  seventies, 
dodging  to  and  fro,  baffled  on  every  tack, 
and  with  our  stores  running  down  to  sweep- 
ings of  bread-lockers  and  scrapings  of  sugar- 
casks.  It  was  just  like  the  East  Wind's 
nature  to  inflict  starvation  upon  the  bodies 
of  unoffending  sailors,  while  he  corrupted 
their  simple  souls  by  an  exasperation  lead- 
ing to  outbursts  of  profanity  as  lurid  as  his 
blood-red  sunrises.  They  were  followed  by 
gray  days  under  the  cover  of  high,  motion- 
less clouds  that  looked  as  if  carved  in  a  slab 
of  ash -colored  marble.  And  each  mean, 
starved  sunset  left  us  calling  with  impreca- 
tions upon  the  West  Wind  even  in  its  most 
veiled,  misty  mood  to  wake  up  and  give  us 
our  liberty,  if  only  to  rush  on  and  dash  the 
heads  of  our  ships  against  the  very  walls  of 
our  unapproachable  home. 


In  the  atmosphere  of  the  Easterly  Weather, 
as  pellucid  as  a  piece  of  crystal  and  refract- 
j6o 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

ing  like  a  prism,  we  could  see  the  appalling 
numbers  of  our  helpless  company,  even  to 
those  who  in  more  normal  conditions  would 
have  remained  invisible,  sails  down  under 
the  horizon.  It  is  the  malicious  pleasure  of 
the  East  Wind  to  augment  the  power  of 
your  eyesight,  in  order,  perhaps,  that  you 
should  see  better  the  perfect  humiliation, 
the  hopeless  character  of  your  captivity. 
Easterly  Weather  is  generally  clear,  and  that 
is  all  that  can  be  said  for  it — almost  super- 
naturally  clear  when  it  likes;  but  whatever 
its  mood,  there  is  something  uncanny  in  its 
nature.  Its  duplicity  is  such  that  it  will  de- 
ceive a  scientific  instrument.  No  barometer 
will  give  warning  of  an  Easterly  Gale,  were  it 
ever  so  wet.  It  would  be  an  unjust  and  un- 
grateful thing  to  say  that  a  barometer  is  a 
stupid  contrivance.  It  is  simply  that  the 
wiles  of  the  East  Wind  are  too  much  for  its 
fundamental  honesty.  After  years  and  years 
of  experience  the  most  trusty  instrument  of 
the  sort  that  ever  went  to  sea  screwed  on  to 
a  ship's  cabin  bulkhead  will,  almost  invari- 
ably, be  induced  to  rise  by  the  diabolic  in- 
genuity of  the  Easterly  Weather,  just  at  the 
161 


The   Mirror  of  the  Sea 

moment  when  the  Easterly  Weather,  dis- 
carding its  methods  of  hard,  dry,  impassive 
cruelty,  contemplates  drowning  what  is  left 
of  your  spirit  in  torrents  of  a  peculiarly  cold 
and  horrid  rain.  The  sleet-and-hail  squalls 
following  the  lightning  at  the  end  of  a 
Westerly  Gale  are  cold  and  benumbing  and 
stinging  and  cruel  enough.  But  the  dry, 
Easterly  Weather,  when  it  turns  to  wet, 
seems  to  rain  poisoned  showers  upon  your 
head.  It  is  a  sort  of  steady,  persistent, 
overwhelming,  endlessly  driving  downpour, 
which  makes  your  heart  sick,  and  opens  it 
to  dismal  forebodings.  And  the  stormy 
mood  of  the  Easterly  Weather  looms  black 
upon  the  sky  with  a  peculiar  and  amazing 
blackness.  The  West  Wind  hangs  heavy 
gray  curtains  of  mist  and  spray  before  your 
gaze,  but  the  Eastern  interloper  of  the  nar- 
row seas,  when  he  has  mustered  his  courage 
and  cruelty  to  the  point  of  a  gale,  puts  your 
eyes  out,  puts  them  out  completely,  makes 
you  feel  blind  for  life  upon  a  lee-shore.  It 
is  the  wind,  also,  that  brings  snow. 

Out    of    his    black    and    merciless    heart 
he  flings  a  white,  blinding  sheet  upon  the 
162 


Rulers  of  East  and  West 

ships  of  the  sea.  He  has  more  manners  of 
villany  and  no  more  conscience  than  an 
Italian  prince  of  the  seventeenth  century. 
His  weapon  is  a  dagger  carried  under  a 
black  cloak  when  he  goes  out  on  his  unlaw- 
ful enterprises.  The  mere  hint  of  his  ap- 
proach fills  with  dread  every  craft  that 
swims  the  sea,  from  fishing-smacks  to  four- 
masted  ships  that  recognize  the  sway  of  the 
West  Wind.  Even  in  his  most  accommo- 
dating mood  he  inspires  a  dread  of  treachery. 
I  have  heard  upward  of  ten  score  of  wind- 
lasses spring  like  one  into  clanking  life  in 
the  dead  of  night,  filling  the  Downs  with  a 
panic-struck  sound  of  anchors  being  torn 
hurriedly  out  of  the  ground  at  the  first 
breath  of  his  approach.  Fortunately,  his 
heart  often  fails  him:  he  does  not  always 
blow  home  upon  our  exposed  coast;  he  has 
not  the  fearless  temper  of  his  Westerly 
brother. 

The  natures  of  those  two  winds  that  share 
the  dominions  of  the  great  oceans  are  funda- 
mentally different.  It  is  strange  that  the 
winds  which  men  are  prone  to  style  capricious 
remain  true  to  their  character  in  all  the  vari- 
163 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ous  regions  of  the  earth.  To  us  here  [in 
England],  for  instance,  the  East  Wind  comes 
across  a  great  continent,  sweeping  over  the 
greatest  body  of  solid  land  upon  this  earth. 
For  the  Australian  east  coast  the  East  Wind 
is  the  wind  of  the  ocean,  coming  across  the 
greatest  body  of  water  upon  the  globe;  and 
yet  here  and  there  its  characteristics  remain 
the  same  with  a  strange  consistency  in  every- 
thing that  is  vile  and  base.  The  members 
of  the  West  Wind's  dynasty  are  modified  in 
a  way  by  the  regions  they  rule,  as  a  Hohen- 
zollern,  without  ceasing  to  be  himself,  be- 
comes a  Roumanian  by  virtue  of  his  throne, 
or  a  Saxe  -  Coburg  learns  to  put  the  dress 
of  Bulgarian  phrases  upon  his  particular 
thoughts,  whatever  they  are. 

The  autocratic  sway  of  the  West  Wind, 
whether  forty  north  or  forty  south  of  the 
equator,  is  characterized  by  an  open,  gen- 
erous, frank,  barbarous  recklessness.  For 
he  is  a  great  autocrat,  and  to  be  a  great 
autocrat  you  must  be  a  great  barbarian.  I 
have  been  too  much  moulded  to  his  sway  to 
nurse  now  any  idea  of  rebellion  in  my  heart. 
Moreover,  what  is  a  rebellion  within  the  four 
164 


Rulers   of  East  and  West 

walls  of  a  room  against  the  tempestuous  rule 
of  the  West  Wind  ?  I  remain  faithful  to  the 
memory  of  the  mighty  king  with  a  double- 
edged  sword  in  one  hand  and  in  the  other 
holding  out  rewards  of  great  daily  runs  and 
famously  quick  passages  to  those  of  his 
courtiers  who  know  how  to  wait  watchfully 
for  every  sign  of  his  secret  mood.  As  we 
deep-water  men  always  reckoned,  he  made 
one  year  in  three  fairly  lively  for  anybody 
having  business  upon  the  Atlantic  or  down 
there  along  the  "forties"  of  the  Southern 
Ocean.  You  had  to  take  the  bitter  with  the 
sweet;  and  it  cannot  be  denied  he  played 
carelessly  with  our  lives  and  fortunes.  But, 
then,  he  was  always  a  great  king,  fit  to  rule 
over  the  great  waters  where,  strictly  speak- 
ing, a  man  would  have  no  business  whatever 
but  for  his  audacity. 

The  audacious  should  not  complain.  A 
mere  trader  ought  not  to  grumble  at  the 
tolls  levied  by  a  mighty  king.  His  mighti- 
ness was  sometimes  very  overwhelming ;  but 
even  when  you  had  to  defy  him  openly,  as 
on  the  banks  of  the  Agulhas  homeward- 
bound  from  the  East  Indies,  or  on  the  out- 
165 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ward  passage  round  the  Horn,  he  struck  at 
you  fairly  his  stinging  blows  (full  in  the 
face,  too),  and  it  was  your  business  not  to 
get  too  much  staggered.  And,  after  all,  if 
you  showed  anything  of  a  countenance,  the 
good-natured  barbarian  would  let  you  fight 
your  way  past  the  very  steps  of  his  throne. 
It  was  only  now  and  then  that  the  sword 
descended  and  a  head  fell;  but  if  you  fell 
you  were  sure  of  impressive  obsequies  and 
of  a  roomy,  generous  grave. 

Such  is  the  king  to  whom  Viking  chief- 
tains bowed  their  heads,  and  whom  the 
modern  and  palatial  steamship  defies  with 
impunity  seven  times  a  week.  And  yet  it  is 
but  defiance,  not  victory.  The  magnificent 
barbarian  sits  enthroned  in  a  mantle  of  gold- 
lined  clouds  looking  from  on  high  on  great 
ships  gliding  like  mechanical  toys  upon  his 
sea,  and  on  men  who,  armed  with  fire  and 
iron,  no  longer  need  to  watch  anxiously  for 
the  slightest  sign  of  his  royal  mood.  He  is 
disregarded;  but  he  has  kept  all  his  strength, 
all  his  splendor,  and  a  great  part  of  his 
power.  Time  itself,  that  shakes  all  the 
thrones,  is  on  the  side  of  that  king.  The 
166 


Rulers   of  East  and  West 

sword  in  his  hand  remains  as  sharp  as  ever 
upon  both  its  edges ;  and  he  may  well  go  on 
playing  his  royal  game  of  quoits  with  hurri- 
canes, tossing  them  over  from  the  continent 
of  republics  to  the  continent  of  kingdoms,  in 
the  assurance  that  both  the  new  republics 
and  the  old  kingdoms,  the  heat  of  fire  and 
the  strength  of  iron,  with  the  untold  genera- 
tions of  audacious  men,  shall  crumble  to 
dust  at  the  steps  of  his  throne,  and  pass 
away  and  be  forgotten  before  his  own  rule 
comes  to  an  end. 


The   Faithful   River 


!HE  estuaries  of  rivers  appeal 
strongly  to  an  adventurous  im- 
agination. This  appeal  is  not 
always  a  charm,  for  there  are 
estuaries  of  a  particularly  dis- 
piriting ugliness:  lowlands,  mud  -  flats,  or 
perhaps  barren  sand  -  hills  without  beauty 
of  form  or  amenity  of  aspect,  covered  with 
a  shabby  and  scanty  vegetation  conveying 
the  impression  of  poverty  and  uselessness. 
Sometimes  such  an  ugliness  is  merely  a  re- 
pulsive mask.  A  river  whose  estuary  re- 
sembles a  breach  in  a  sand  rampart  may 
flow  through  a  most  fertile  country.  But 
all  the  estuaries  of  great  rivers  have  their 
fascination,  the  attractiveness  of  an  open 
portal.  Water  is  friendly  to  man.  The 
ocean,  a  part  of  nature  farthest  removed  in 
the  unchangeableness  and  majesty  of  its 
168 


The   Faithful   River 

might  from  the  spirit  of  mankind,  has  ever 
been  a  friend  to  the  enterprising  nations  of 
the  earth.  And  of  all  the  elements  this  is 
the  one  to  which  men  have  always  been 
prone  to  trust  themselves,  as  if  its  im- 
mensity held  a  reward  as  vast  as  itself. 

From  the  offing  the  open  estuary  promises 
every  possible  fruition  to  adventurous  hopes. 
That  road  open  to  enterprise  and  courage 
;  invites  the  explorer  of  coasts  to  new  efforts 
;  towards  the  fulfilment  of  great  expectations. 
The  commander  of  the  first  Roman  galley 
must  have  looked  with  an  intense  absorp- 
tion upon  the  estuary  of  the  Thames  as 
he  turned  the  beaked  prow  of  his  ship  to 
the  westward  under  the  brow  of  the  North 
Foreland.  The  estuary  of  the  Thames  is 
not  beautiful;  it  has  no  noble  features,  no 
romantic  grandeur  of  aspect,  no  smiling 
geniality;  but  it  is  wide  open,  spacious,  in- 
viting, hospitable  at  the  first  glance,  with  a 
strange  air  of  mysteriousness  which  lingers 
about  it  to  this  very  day.  The  navigation 
•of  his  craft  must  have  engrossed  all  the 
Roman's  attention  in  the  calm  of  a  sum- 
mer's day  (he  would  choose  his  weather), 
169 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

when  the  single  row  of  long  sweeps  (the  gal- 
ley would  be  a  light  one,   not  a  trireme) 
could  fall  in  easy  cadence  upon  a  sheet  of 
water  like   plate-glass,   reflecting  faithfully 
the  classic  form  of  his  vessel  and  the  contour 
of  the  lonely  shores  close  on  his  left  hand. 
I  assume  he  followed  the  land  and  passed 
through  what  is  at  present  known  as  Mar- 
gate Roads,  groping  his  careful  way  along 
the  hidden  sand-banks,  whose  every  tail  and 
spit  has  its  beacon  or  buoy  nowadays.     He 
must  have  been  anxious,  though  no  doubt 
he  had  collected  beforehand  on  the  shores 
of  the  Gauls  a  store  of  information  from 
the  talk  of  traders,  adventurers,  fishermen, 
slave-dealers,  pirates — all  sorts  of  unofficial 
men  connected  with  the  sea  in  a  more  or  less 
reputable  way.     He  would  have  heard  of 
channels  and  sand-banks,  of  natural  features 
of  the  land  useful  for  sea-marks,  of  villages 
and  tribes  and  modes  of  barter  and  precau- 
tions  to   take:   with    the    instructive    tales 
about  native  chiefs  dyed  more  or  less  blue, 
whose  character  for  greediness,  ferocity,  or 
amiability  must  have  been   expounded   to 
him  with  that  capacity  for  vivid  language 
170 


The  Faithful  River 

which  seems  joined  naturally  to  the  shadi- 
ness  of  moral  character  and  recklessness  of 
disposition.  With  that  sort  of  spiced  food 
provided  for  his  anxious  thought,  watchful 
for  strange  men,  strange  beasts,  strange 
turns  of  the  tide,  he  would  make  the  best  of 
his  way  up,  a  military  seaman  with  a  short 
sword  on  thigh  and  a  bronze  helmet  on  his 
head,  the  pioneer  post-captain  of  an  im- 
perial fleet.  Was  the  tribe  inhabiting  the 
Isle  of  Thanet  of  a  ferocious  disposition,  I 
wonder,  and  ready  to  fall  with  stone-studded 
clubs  and  wooden  lances  hardened  in  the 
fire,  upon  the  backs  of  unwary  mariners  ? 

Among  the  great  commercial  streams  of 
these  islands,  the  Thames  is  the  only  one,  I 
think,  open  to  romantic  feeling,  from  the 
fact  that  the  sight  of  human  labor  and  the 
sounds  of  human  industry  do  not  come 
down  its  shores  to  the  very  sea,  destroying 
the  suggestion  of  mysterious  vastness  caused 
by  the  configuration  of  the  shore.  The 
broad  inlet  of  the  shallow  North  Sea  passes 
gradually  into  the  contracted  shape  of  the 
river;  but  for  a  long  time  the  feeling  of  the 
open  water  remains  with  the  ship  steering 

13  171 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

to  the  westward  through  one  of  the  lighted 
and  buoyed  passageways  of  the  Thames, 
such  as  Queen's  Channel,  Prince's  Channel, 
Four-Fathom  Channel;  or  else  coming  down 
the  Swin  from  the  north.  The  rush  of  the 
yellow  flood-tide  hurries  her  up  as  if  into 
the  unknown  between  the  two  fading  lines 
of  the  coast.  There  are  no  features  to  this 
land,  no  conspicuous,  far-famed  landmarks 
for  the  eye;  there  is  nothing  so  far  down  to 
tell  you  of  the  greatest  agglomeration  of 
mankind  on  earth  dwelling  no  more  than 
twenty  miles  away,  where  the  sun  sets  in  a 
blaze  of  color  flaming  on  a  gold  background, 
and  the  dark,  low  shores  trend  towards  each 
other.  And  in  the  great  silence  the  deep, 
faint  booming  of  the  big  guns  being  tested 
at  Shoeburyness  hangs  about  the  Nore — a 
historical  spot  in  the  keeping  of  one  of  Eng- 
land's appointed  guardians. 


The  Nore  sand  remains  covered  at  low- 
water,  and  never  seen  by  human  eye;  but 
the  Nore  is  a  name  to  conjure  with  visions 
172 


The  Faithful   River 

of  historical  events,  of  battles,  of  fleets,  of 
mutinies,  of  watch  and  ward  kept  upon  the 
great,  throbbing  heart  of  the  state.  This 
ideal  point  of  the  estuary,  this  centre  of 
memories,  is  marked  upon  the  steely  gray 
expanse  of  the  waters  by  a  light-ship  paint- 
ed red,  that,  from  a  couple  of  miles  off,  looks 
like  a  cheap  and  bizarre  little  toy.  I  re- 
member how,  'on  coming  up  the  river  for  the 
first  time,  I  was  surprised  at  the  smallness 
of  that  vivid  object — a  tiny,  warm  speck  of 
crimson  lost  in  an  immensity  of  gray  tones. 
I  was  startled,  as  if  of  necessity  the  princi- 
pal beacon  in  the  waterway  of  the  greatest 
town  on  earth  should  have  presented  impos- 
ing proportions.  And,  behold!  the  brown 
sprit-sail  of  a  barge  hid  it  entirely  from  my 
view. 

Coming  in  from  the  eastward,  the  bright 
coloring  of  the  light-ship  marking  the  part  of 
the  river  committed  to  the  charge  of  an  ad- 
miral (the  commander-in-chief  at  the  Nore) 
accentuates  the  dreariness  and  the  great 
breadth  of  the  Thames  estuary.  But  soon 
the  course  of  the  ship  opens  the  entrance  of 
the  Medway,  with  its  men-of-war  moored  in 
i73 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

line,  and  the  long,  wooden  jetty  of  Port  Vic- 
toria, with  its  few  low  buildings  like  the  be- 
ginning of  a  hasty  settlement  upon  a  wild 
and  unexplored  shore.  The  famous  Thames 
barges  sit  in  brown  clusters  upon  the  water 
with  an  effect  of  birds  floating  upon  a  pond. 
On  the  imposing  expanse  of  the  great  estuary 
the  traffic  of  the  port  where  so  much  of  the 
world's  work  and  the  world's  thinking  is 
being  done  becomes  insignificant,  scattered, 
streaming  away  in  thin  lines  of  ships  string- 
ing themselves  out  into  the  eastern  quarter 
through  the  various  navigable  channels  of 
which  the  Nore  light- ship  marks  the  diver- 
gence. The  coasting  traffic  inclines  to  the 
north ;  the  deep-water  ships  steer  east  with  a 
southern  inclination,  on  through  the  Downs, 
to  the  most  remote  ends  of  the  world.  In 
the  widening  of  the  shores  sinking  low  in 
the  gray,  smoky  distances  the  greatness  of 
the  sea  receives  the  mercantile  fleet  of  good 
ships  that  London  sends  out  upon  the  turn 
of  every  tide.  They  follow  one  another,  go- 
ing very  close  by  the  Essex  shore.  Like  the 
beads  of  a  rosary  told  by  business-like  ship- 
owners for  the  greater  profit  of  the  world 
i74 


The  Faithful  River 

they  slip  one  by  one  into  the  open:  while  in 
the  offing  the  inward-bound  ships  come  up 
singly  and  in  bunches  from  under  the  sea- 
horizon  closing  the  mouth  of  the  river  be- 
tween Orfordness  and  North  Foreland.  They 
all  converge  upon  the  Nore,  the  warm  speck 
of  red  upon  the  tones  of  drab  and  gray,  with 
the  distant  shores  running  together  tow- 
ards the  west;  low  and  flat,  like  the  sides  of 
an  enormous  canal.  The  sea  -  reach  of  the 
Thames  is  straight,  and,  once  Sheerness  is 
left  behind,  its  banks  seem  very  uninhabited, 
except  for  the  cluster  of  houses  which  is 
Southend,  or  here  and  there  a  lonely  wooden 
jetty  where  petroleum  ships  discharge  theit 
dangerous  cargoes,  and  the  oil-storage  tanks, 
low  and  round  with  slightly  domed  roofs, 
peep  over  the  edge  of  the  foreshore,  as  it 
were  a  village  of  Central  African  huts  imi- 
tated in  iron.  Bordered  by  the  black  and 
shining  mud-flats,  the  level  marsh  extends 
for  miles.  Away  in  the  far  background  the 
land  rises,  closing  the  view  with  a  continu- 
ous wooded  slope,  forming  in  the  distance 
an  interminable  rampart  overgrown  with 
bushes, 

175 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Then,  on  the  slight  turn  of  the  Lower 
Hope  Reach,  clusters  of  factory  chimneys 
come  distinctly  into  view,  tall  and  slender 
above  the  squat  ranges  of  cement  works  in 
Grays  and  Greenhithe.  Smoking  quietly  at 
the  top  against  the  great  blaze  of  a  magnifi- 
cent sunset,  they  give  an  industrial  character 
to  the  scene,  speak  of  work,  manufactures, 
and  trade,  as  palm-groves  on  the  coral 
strands  of  distant  islands  speak  of  the  lux- 
uriant grace,  beauty,  and  vigor  of  tropical 
nature.  The  houses  of  Gravesend  crowd 
upon  the  shore  with  an  effect  of  confusion  as 
if  they  had  tumbled  down  hap-hazard  from 
the  top  of  the  hill  at  the  back.  The  flatness 
of  the  Kentish  shore  ends  there.  A  fleet  of 
steam-tugs  lies  at  anchor  in  front  of  the 
various  piers.  A  conspicuous  church-spire, 
the  first  seen  distinctly  coming  from  the  sea, 
has  a  thoughtful  grace,  the  serenity  of  a  fine 
form  above  the  chaotic  disorder  of  men's 
houses.  But  on  the  other  side,  on  the  flat 
Essex  side,  a  shapeless  and  desolate  red  edi- 
fice, a  vast  pile  of  bricks  with  many  windows 
and  a  slate  roof  more  inaccessible  than  an 
Alpine  slope,  towers  over  the  bend  in  mon- 
176 


The  Faithful   River 

strous  ugliness,  the  tallest,  heaviest  building 
for  miles  around,  a  thing  like  a  hotel,  like  a 
mansion  of  flats  (all  to  let),  exiled  into  these 
fields  out  of  a  street  in  West  Kensington. 
Just  round  the  corner,  as  it  were,  on  a  pier 
defined  with  stone  blocks  and  wooden  piles, 
a  white  mast,  slender  like  a  stalk  of  straw 
and  crossed  by  a  yard  like  a  knitting- 
needle,  flying-  the  signals  of  flag  and  balloon, 
watches  over  a  set  of  heavy  dock-gates. 
Mast-heads  and  funnel-tops  of  ships  peep 
above  the  ranges  of  corrugated  iron  roofs. 
This  is  the  entrance  to  Tilbury  Dock,  the 
most  recent  of  all  London  docks,  the  nearest 
to  the  sea. 

Between  the  crowded  houses  of  Graves- 
end  and  the  monstrous  red-brick  pile  on  the 
Essex  shore  the  ship  is  surrendered  fairly  to 
the  grasp  of  the  river.  That  hint  of  loneli- 
ness, that  soul  of  the  sea  which  had  accom- 
panied her  as  far  as  the  Lower  Hope  Reach, 
abandons  her  at  the  turn  of  the  first  bend 
above.  The  salt,  acrid  flavor  is  gone  out  of 
the  air,  together  with  a  sense  of  unlimited 
space  opening  free  beyond  the  threshold  of 
sand-banks  below  the  Nore.  The  waters  of 
177 


The.  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

the  sea  rush  on  past  Gravesend,  tumbling 
the  big  mooring-buoys  laid  along  the  face  of 
the  town;  but  the  sea-freedom  stops  short 
there,  surrendering  the  salt  tide  to  the  needs, 
the  artifices,  the  contrivances  of  toiling  men. 
Wharves,  landing-places,  dock-gates,  water- 
side stairs,  follow  one  another  continuously 
right  up  to  London  Bridge,  and  the  hum  of 
men's  work  fills  the  river  with  a  menacing, 
muttering  note  as  of  a  breathless,  ever- 
driving  gale.  The  waterway,  so  fair  above 
and  wide  below,  flows  oppressed  by  bricks 
and  mortar  and  stone,  by  blackened  timber 
and  grimed  glass  and  rusty  iron,  covered 
with  black  barges,  whipped  up  by  paddles 
and  screws,  overburdened  with  craft,  over- 
hung with  chains,  overshadowed  by  walls 
making  a  steep  gorge  for  its  bed,  filled  with 
a  haze  of  smoke  and  dust. 

This  stretch  of  the  Thames  from  London 
Bridge  to  the  Albert  Docks  is  to  other 
water  -  sides  of  river  -  ports  what  a  virgin 
forest  would  be  to  a  garden.  It  is  a  thing 
grown  up,  not  made.  It  recalls  a  jungle  by 
the  confused,  varied,  and  impenetrable  as- 
pect of  the  buildings  that  line  the  shore,  not 
i78 


The  Faithful   River 

according  to  a  planned  purpose,  but  as  if 
sprung  up  by  accident  from  scattered  seeds. 
Like  the  matted  growth  of  bushes  and 
creepers  veiling  the  silent  depths  of  an  un- 
explored wilderness,  they  hide  the  depths  of 
London's  infinitely  varied,  vigorous,  seeth- 
ing life.  In  other  river -ports  it  is  not  so. 
They  lie  open  to  their  stream,  with  quays 
like  broad  clearings,  with  streets  like  ave- 
nues cut  through  thick  timber  for  the  con- 
venience of  trade.  I  am  thinking  now  of 
river-ports  I  have  seen — of  Antwerp,  for  in- 
stance; of  Nantes  or  Bordeaux,  or  even  old 
Rouen,  where  the  night-watchmen  of  ships, 
elbows  on  rail,  gaze  at  shop-windows  and 
brilliant  caf6s,  and  see  the  audience  go  in 
and  come  out  of  the  opera-house.  But 
London,  the  oldest  and  greatest  of  river- 
ports,  does  not  possess  as  much  as  a  'hun- 
dred yards  of  open  quays  upon  its  river- 
front. Dark  and  impenetrable  at  night,  like 
the  face  of  a  forest,  is  London's  water-side. 
It  is  the  water -side  of  water -sides,  where 
only  one  aspect  of  the  world's  life  can  be 
seen,  and  only  one  kind  of  men  toils  on  the 
edge  of  the  stream.  The  lightless  walls 
i79 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

seem  to  spring  from  the  very  mud  upon 
which  the  stranded  barges  lie ;  and  the  nar- 
row lanes  coming  down  to  the  foreshore  re- 
semble the  paths  of  smashed  bushes  and 
crumbled  earth  where  big  game  comes  to 
drink  on  the  banks  of  tropical  streams. 

Behind  the  growth  of  the  London  water- 
side the  docks  of  London  spread  out  unsus- 
pected, smooth,  and  placid,  lost  among  the 
buildings  like  dark  lagoons  hidden  in  a 
thick  forest.  They  lie  concealed  in  the  in- 
tricate growth  of  houses  with  a  few  stalks 
of  mast-heads  here  and  there  overtopping 
the  roof  of  some  seven-story  warehouse. 

It  is  a  strange  conjunction,  this,  of  roofs 
and  mast-heads,  of  walls  and  yard-arms.  I 
remember  once  having  the  incongruity  of 
the  relation  brought  home  to  me  in  a  prac- 
tical way.  I  was  the  chief  officer  of  a  fine 
ship,  just  docked  with  a  cargo  of  wool  from 
Sydney,  after  a  ninety  days'  passage.  In 
fact,  we  had  not  been  in  more  than  half  an 
hour  and  I  was  still  busy  making  her  fast  to 
the  stone  posts  of  a  very  narrow  quay  in 
front  of  a  lofty  warehouse.  An  old  man 
with  a  gray  whisker  under  the  chin  and 
1 80 


The  Faithful   River 

brass  buttons  on  his  pilot-cloth  jacket,  hur- 
ried up  along  the  quay  hailing  my  ship  by 
name.  He  was  one  of  those  officials  called 
berthing  -  masters  —  not  the  one  who  had 
berthed  us,  but  another,  who,  apparently, 
had  been  busy  securing  a  steamer  at  the 
other  end  of  the  dock.  I  could  see  from 
afar  his  hard  blue  eyes  staring  at  us,  as  if 
fascinated,  with  a  queer  sort  of  absorption. 
I  wondered  what  that  worthy  sea-dog  had 
found  to  criticise  in  my  ship's  rigging.  And 
I,  too,  glanced  aloft  anxiously.  I  could  see 
nothing  wrong  there.  But  perhaps  that 
superannuated  fellow-craftsman  was  simply 
admiring  the  ship's  perfect  order  aloft,  I 
thought  with  some  secret  pride ;  for  the  chief 
officer  is  responsible  for  his  ship's  appear- 
ance, and  as  to  her  outward  condition,  he  is 
the  man  open  to  praise  or  blame.  Mean- 
time the  old  salt  (" ex-coasting  skipper" 
was  writ  large  all  over  his  person)  had 
hobbled  up  alongside  in  his  bumpy,  shiny 
boots,  and,  waving  an  arm,  short  and  thick 
like  the  flipper  of  a  seal,  terminated  by  a 
paw  red  as  an  uncooked  beefsteak,  addressed 
the  poop  in  a  muffled,  faint,  roaring  voice, 
181 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

as  if  a  sample  of  every  North  Sea  fog  of  his 
life  had  been  permanently  lodged  in  his 
throat:  "Haul  'em  round,  Mr.  Mate!"  were 
his  words.  "If  you  don't  look  sharp,  you'll 
have  your  top  -  gallant  -  yards  through  the 
windows  of  that  'ere  warehouse  presently." 
This  was  the  only  cause  of  his  interest  in 
the  ship's  beautiful  spars.  I  own  that  for  a 
time  I  was  struck  dumb  by  the  bizarre  as- 
sociations of  yard-arms  and  window-panes. 
To  break  windows  is  the  last  thing  one 
would  think  of  in  connection  with  a  ship's 
top -gallant -yard,  unless,  indeed,  one  were 
an  experienced  berthing  -  master  in  one  of 
the  London  docks.  This  old  chap  was  do- 
ing his  little  share  of  the  world's  work  with 
proper  efficiency.  His  little,  blue  eyes  had 
made  out  the  danger  many  hundred  yards 
off.  His  rheumaticky  feet,  tired  with  bal- 
ancing that  squat  body  for  many  years  upon 
the  decks  of  small  coasters,  and  made  sore 
by  miles  of  tramping  upon  the  flag  -  stones 
of  the  dock-side,  had  hurried  up  in  time  to 
avert  a  ridiculous  catastrophe.  I  answered 
him  pettishly,  I  fear,  and  as  if  I  had  known 
all  about  it  before. 

J8? 


The  Faithful   River 

"All  right,  all  right!  can't  do  everything 
at  once." 

He  remained  near  by,  muttering  to  him- 
self till  the  yards  had  been  hauled  round  at 
my  order,  and  then  raised  again  his  foggy, 
thick  voice : 

"None  too  soon,"  he  observed,  with  a 
critical  glance  up  at  the  towering  side  of  the 
warehouse.  ' '  That 's  a  half-sovereign  in  your 
pocket,  Mr.  Mate.  You  should  always  look 
first  how  you  are  for  them  windows  before 
you  begin  to  breast  in  your  ship  to  the 
quay." 

It  was  good  advice.  But  one  cannot 
think  of  everything  or  foresee  contacts  of 
things  apparently  as  remote  as  stars  and 
hop-poles. 


The  view  of  ships  lying  moored  in  some  of 
the  older  docks  of  London  has  always  sug- 
gested to  my  mind  the  image  of  a  flock  of 
swans  kept  in  the  flooded  back-yard  of  grim 
tenement-houses.  The  flatness  of  the  walls 
surrounding  the  dark  pool  on  which  they 
183 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

float  brings  out  wonderfully  the  flowing 
grace  of  the  lines  on  which  a  ship's  hull  is 
built.  The  lightness  of  these  forms,  de- 
vised to  meet  the  winds  and  the  seas,  makes, 
by  contrast  with  the  great  piles  of  bricks, 
the  chains  and  cables  of  their  moorings  ap- 
pear very  necessary,  as  if  nothing  less  could 
prevent  them  from  soaring  upward  and  over 
the  roofs.  The  least  puff  of  wind  stealing 
round  the  corners  of  the  dock  buildings  stirs 
these  captives  fettered  to  rigid  shores.  It  is 
as  if  the  soul  of  a  ship  were  impatient  of 
confinement.  Those  masted  hulls,  relieved 
of  their  cargo,  become  restless  at  the  slight- 
est hint  of  the  wind's  freedom.  However 
tightly  moored,  they  range  a  little  at  their 
berths,  swaying  imperceptibly  the  spirelike 
assemblages  of  cordage  and  spars.  You  can 
detect  their  impatience  by  watching  the 
sway  of  the  mast-heads  against  the  motion- 
less, the  soulless  gravity  of  mortar  and 
stones.  As  you  pass  alongside  each  hope- 
less prisoner  chained  to  the  quay,  the  slight 
grinding  noise  of  the  wooden  fenders  makes 
a  sound  of  angry  muttering.  But,  after  all, 
it  may  be  good  for  ships  to  go  through  a 
184 


The  Faithful   River 

period  of  restraint  and  repose,  as  the  re- 
straint and  self  -  communion  of  inactivity 
may  be  good  for  an  unruly  soul — not,  in- 
deed, that  I  mean  to  say  that  ships  are  un- 
ruly; on  the  contrary,  they  are  faithful 
creatures,  as  so  many  men  can  testify.  And 
faithfulness  is  a  great  restraint,  the  strongest 
bond  laid  upon  the  self-will  of  men  and  ships 
on  this  globe  of  land  and  sea. 

This  interval  of  bondage  in  the  docks 
rounds  each  period  of  a  ship's  life  with  the 
sense  of  accomplished  duty,  of  an  effectively 
played  part  in  the  work  of  the  world.  The 
dock  is  the  scene  of  what  the  world  would 
think  the  most  serious  part  in  the  light, 
bounding,  swaying  life  of  a  ship.  But  there 
are  docks  and  docks.  The  ugliness  of  some 
docks  is  appalling.  Wild  horses  would  not 
drag  from  me  the  name  of  a  certain  river  in 
the  north  whose  narrow  estuary  is  inhos- 
pitable and  dangerous,  and  whose  docks  are 
like  a  nightmare  of  dreariness  and  misery. 
Their  dismal  shores  are  studded  thickly  with 
scaffold-like,  enormous  timber  structures, 
whose  lofty  heads  are  veiled  periodically  by 
the  infernal  gritty  night  of  a  cloud  of  coal- 
x8j 


The  Mirror  of  the   Sea 

dust.  The  most  important  ingredient  for 
getting  the  world's  work  along  is  distributed 
there  under  the  circumstances  of  the  greatest 
cruelty  meted  out  to  helpless  ships.  Shut 
up  in  the  desolate  circuit  of  these  basins, 
you  would  think  a  free  ship  would  droop 
and  die  like  a  wild  bird  put  into  a  dirty 
cage.  But  a  ship,  perhaps  because  of  her 
faithfulness  to  men,  will  endure  an  extraor- 
dinary lot  of  ill-usage.  Still,  I  have  seen 
ships  issue  from  certain  docks  like  half-dead 
prisoners  from  a  dungeon,  bedraggled,  over- 
come, wholly  disguised  in  dirt,  and  with 
their  men  rolling  white  eyeballs  in  black 
and  worried  faces  raised  to  a  heaven  which, 
in  its  smoky  and  soiled  aspect,  seemed  to 
reflect  the  sordidness  of  the  earth  below. 
One  thing,  however,  may  be  said  for  the 
docks  of  the  port  of  London  on  both  sides 
of  the  river:  for  all  the  complaints  of  their 
insufficient  equipment,  of  their  obsolete 
rules,  of  failure  (they  say)  in  the  matter  of 
quick  despatch,  no  ship  need  ever  issue  from 
their  gates  in  a  half  -  fainting  condition. 
London  is  a  general  cargo  port,  as  is  only 
proper  for  the  greatest  capital  of  the  world 
186 


The  Faithful   River 

to  be.  General  cargo  ports  belong  to  the 
aristocracy  of  the  earth's  trading  -  places, 
and  in  that  aristocracy  London,  as  is  its 
way,  has  a  unique  physiognomy. 

The  absence  of  picturesqueness  cannot  be 
laid  to  the  charge  of  the  docks  opening  into 
the  Thames.  For  all  my  unkind  compari- 
son to  swans  and  backyards,  it  cannot  be 
denied  that  each  dock  or  group  of  docks 
along  the  north  side  of  the  river  has  its  own 
individual  attractiveness.  Beginning  with 
the  cosey  little  St.  Katherine's  Dock,  lying 
overshadowed  and  black  like  a  quiet  pool 
among  rocky  crags,  through  the  venerable 
and  sympathetic  London  Docks,  with  not  a 
single  line  of  rails  in  the  whole  of  their  area 
and  the  aroma  of  spices  lingering  between 
its  warehouses,  with  their  far-famed  wine- 
cellars — down  through  the  interesting  group 
of  West  India  Docks,  the  fine  docks  at 
Blackwall,  on  past  the  Galleons  Reach  en- 
trance of  the  Victoria  and  Albert  Docks, 
right  down  to  the  vast  gloom  of  the  great 
basins  in  Tilbury,  each  of  those  places  of 
restraint  for  ships  has  its  own  peculiar  phys- 
iognomy,  its   own   expression.     And   what 

i3  187 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

makes  them  unique  and  attractive  is  their 
common  trait  of  being  romantic  in  their 
usefulness. 

In  their  way  they  are  as  romantic  as  the 
river  they  serve  is  unlike  all  the  other  com- 
mercial streams  of  the  world.  The  cosiness 
of  the  St.  Katherine's  Dock,  the  old-world 
air  of  the  London  Docks,  remain  impressed 
upon  the  memory.  The  docks  down  the 
river,  abreast  of  Woolwich,  are  imposing  by 
their  proportions  and  the  vast  scale  of  the 
ugliness  that  forms  their  surroundings — 
ugliness  so  picturesque  as  to  become  a  de- 
light to  the  eye.  When  one  talks  of  the 
Thames  docks  "beauty"  is  a  vain  word,  but 
romance  has  lived  too  long  upon  this  river 
not  to  have  thrown  a  mantle  of  glamour 
upon  its  banks. 

The  antiquity  of  the  port  appeals  to  the 
imagination  by  the  long  chain  of  adventu- 
rous enterprises  that  had  their  inception  in 
the  town  and  floated  out  into  the  world  on 
the  waters  of  the  river.  Even  the  newest  of 
the  docks,  the  Tilbury  Dock,  shares  in  the 
glamour  conferred  by  historical  associations. 
Queen  Elizabeth  has  made  one  of  her  prog- 
z88 


The  Faithful    River 

r esses  down  there,  not  one  of  her  journeys 
of  pomp  and  ceremony,  but  an  anxious  busi- 
ness progress  at  a  crisis  of  national  history. 
The  menace  of  that  time  has  passed  away, 
and  now  Tilbury  is  known  by  its  docks. 
These  are  very  modern,  but  their  remote- 
ness and  isolation  upon  the  Essex  marsh, 
the  days  of  failure  attending  their  creation, 
invested  them  with  a  romantic  air.  Noth- 
ing in  those  days  could  have  been  more 
striking  than  the  vast,  empty  basins,  sur- 
rounded by  miles  of  bare  quays  and  the 
ranges  of  cargo -sheds,  where  two  or  three 
ships  seemed  lost  like  bewitched  children 
in  a  forest  of  gaunt,  hydraulic  cranes.  One 
received  a  wonderful  impression  of  utter 
abandonment,  of  wasted  efficiency.  From 
the  first  the  Tilbury  Docks  were  very  effi- 
cient and  ready  for  their  task,  but  they  had 
come,  perhaps,  too  soon  into  the  field.  A 
great  future  lies  before  Tilbury  Docks. 
They  shall  never  fill  a  long-felt  want  (in  the 
sacramental  phrase  that  is  applied  to  rail- 
ways, tunnels,  newspapers,  and  new  editions 
of  books).  They  were  too  early  in  the  field. 
The  want  shall  never  be  felt  because,  free  of 
189 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

the  trammels  of  the  tide,  easy  of  access, 
magnificent  and  desolate,  they  are  already 
there,  prepared  to  take  and  keep  the  biggest 
ships  that  float  upon  the  sea.  They  are 
worthy  of  the  oldest  river-port  in  the  world. 
And,  truth  to  say,  for  all  the  criticisms 
flung  upon  the  heads  of  the  dock  com- 
panies, the  other  docks  of  the  Thames  are 
no  disgrace  to  the  town  with  a  population 
greater  than  that  of  some  commonwealths. 
The  growth  of  London  as  a  well-equipped 
port  has  been  slow,  while  not  unworthy  of  a 
great  capital,  of  a  great  centre  of  distribu- 
tion. It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  London 
has  not  the  backing  of  great  industrial  dis- 
tricts or  great  fields  of  natural  exploitation. 
In  this  it  differs  from  Liverpool,  from  Cardiff, 
from  Newcastle,  from  Glasgow;  and  therein 
the  Thames  differs  from  the  Mersey,  from 
the  Tyne,  from  the  Clyde.  It  is  a  historical 
river ;  it  is  a  romantic  stream  flowing  through 
the  centre  of  great  affairs,  and  for  all  the 
criticisms  of  the  rivers  administration,  my 
contention  is  that  its  development  has  been 
worthy  of  its  dignity.  For  a  long  time  the 
stream  itself  could  accommodate  quite  easily 
190 


The   Faithful   River 

the  oversea  and  coasting  traffic.  That  was 
in  the  days  when,  in  the  part  called  the 
Pool,  just  below  London  Bridge,  the  vessels 
moored  stem  and  stern  in  the  very  strength 
of  the  tide  formed  one  solid  mass  like  an 
island  covered  with  a  forest  of  gaunt,  leaf- 
less trees ;  and  when  the  trade  had  grown  too 
big  for  the  river,  there  came  the  St.  Kath- 
erine's  Docks'  and  the  London  Docks,  mag- 
nificent undertakings  answering  to  the  need 
of  their  time.  The  same  -may  be  said  of  the 
other  artificial  lakes  full  of  ships  that  go  in 
and  out  upon  this  high-road  to  all-  parts  of 
the  world.  The  labor  of  the  imperial  water- 
way goes  on  from  generation  to  generation, 
goes  on  day  and  night.  Nothing  ever  ar- 
rests its  sleepless  industry  but  the  coming  of 
a  heavy  fog,  which  clothes  the  teeming 
stream  in  a  mantle  of  impenetrable  stillness. 
After  the  gradual  cessation  of  all  sound 
and  movement  on  the  faithful  river,  only 
the  ringing  of  ships'  bells  is  heard,  mysteri- 
ous and  muffled  in  the  white  vapor  from 
London  Bridge  right  down  to  the  Nore,  for 
miles  and  miles  in  a  decrescendo  tinkling,  to 
where  the   estuary  broadens   out   into   the 

101 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

North  Sea,  and  the  anchored  ships  lie  scat- 
tered thinly  in  the  shrouded  channels  be- 
tween the  sand  -  banks  of  the  Thames 's 
mouth.  Through  the  long  and  glorious  tale 
of  years  of  the  river's  strenuous  service  to 
its  people  these  are  its  only  breathing  times. 


In   Captivity 


SHIP  in  dock,  surrounded  by 
quays  and  the  walls  of  ware- 
houses, has  the  appearance  of 
a  prisoner  meditating  upon  free- 
dom in  the  sadness  of  a  free 
spirit  put  under  restraint.  Chain  cables 
and  stout  ropes  keep  her  bound  to  stone 
posts  at  the  edge  of  a  paved  shore,  and 
a  berthing  -  master,  with  brass  buttons  on 
his  coat,  walks  about  like  a  weather-beaten 
and  ruddy  jailer,  casting  jealous,  watchful 
glances  upon,  the  moorings  that  fetter  a  ship 
lying  passive  and  still  and  safe,  as  if  lost  in 
deep  regrets  of  her  days  of  liberty  and 
danger  on  the  sea. 

The  swarm  of  renegades  —  dock-masters, 

berthing-masters,  gatemen,  and  such  like — 

appear    to    nurse    an    immense   distrust   of 

the  captive  ship's  resignation.     There  never 

193 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

seem  chains  and  ropes  enough  to  satisfy 
their  minds  concerned  with  the  safe  binding 
of  free  ships  to  the  strong,  muddy,  enslaved 
earth.  "You  had  better  put  another  bight 
of  a  hawser  astern,  Mr.  Mate,"  is  the  usual 
phrase  in  their  mouths.  I  brand  them  for 
renegades,  because  most  of  them  have  been 
sailors  in  their  time.  As  if  the  infirmities  of 
old  age — the  gray  hair,  the  wrinkles  at  the 
corners  of  the  eyes,  and  the  knotted  veins 
of  the  hands — were  the  symptoms  of  moral 
poison,  they  prowl  about  the  quays  with  an 
underhand  air  of  gloating  over  the  broken 
spirit  of  noble  captives.  They  want  more 
fenders,  more  breasting-ropes ;  they  want 
more  springs,  more  shackles,  more  fetters; 
they  want  to  make  ships  with  volatile  souls 
as  motionless  as  square  blocks  of  stone. 
They  stand  on  the  mud  of  pavements,  these 
degraded  sea-dogs,  with  long  lines  of  rail- 
way trucks  clanking  their  couplings  behind 
their  backs,  and  run  malevolent  glances  over 
your  ship  from  head -gear  to  taflrail,  only 
wishing  to  tyrannize  over  the  poor  creature, 
under  the  hypocritical  cloak  of  benevolence 
and  care.  Here  and  there  cargo-cranes  look- 
194 


In  Captivity 

ing  like  instruments  of  torture  for  ships 
swing  cruel  hooks  at  the  end  of  long  chains. 
Gangs  of  dock-laborers  swarm  with  muddy 
feet  over  the  gangways.  It  is  a  moving 
sight  this,  of  so  many  men  of  the  earth 
earthy,  who  never  cared  anything  for  a  ship, 
trampling  unconcerned,  brutal  and  hob- 
nailed upon  her  helpless  body. 

Fortunately,  nothing  can  deface  the  beau- 
ty of  a  ship.  That  sense  of  a  dungeon,  that 
sense  of  a  horrible  and  degrading  misfort- 
une overtaking  a  creature  fair  to  see  and 
safe  to  trust,  attaches  only  to  ships  moored 
in  the  docks  of  great  European  ports.  You 
feel  that  they  are  dishonestly  locked  up,  to 
be  hunted  about  from  wharf  to  wharf  on  a 
dark,  greasy,  square  pool  of  black  water  as 
a  brutal  reward  at  the  end  of  a  faithful 
voyage. 

A  ship  anchored  in  an  open  roadstead, 
with  cargo  -  lighters  alongside  and  her  own 
tackle  swinging  the  burden  over  the  rail,  is 
accomplishing  in  freedom  a  function  of  her 
life.  There  is  no  restraint;  there  is  space: 
clear  water  around  her,  and  a  clear  sky 
above  her  mast-heads,  with  a  landscape  of 

*95 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

green  hills  and  charming  bays  opening 
around  her  anchorage.  She  is  not  aban- 
doned by  her  own  men  to  the  tender  mercies 
of  shore  people.  She  still  shelters,  and  is 
looked  after  by,  her  own  little,  devoted  band, 
and  you  feel  that  presently  she  will  glide  be- 
tween the  headlands  and  disappear.  It  is 
only  at  home,  in  dock,  that  she  lies  aban- 
doned, shut  off  from  freedom  by  all  the 
artifices  of  men  that  think  of  quick  despatch 
and  profitable  freights.  It  is  only  then  that 
the  odious,  rectangular  shadows  of  walls 
and  roofs  fall  upon  her  decks,  with  showers 
of  soot. 

To  a  man  who  has  never  seen  the  ex- 
traordinary nobility,  strength,  and  grace 
that  the  devoted  generations  of  ship-builders 
have  evolved  from  some  pure  nooks  of  their 
simple  souls,  the  sight  that  could  be  seen 
five-and-twenty  years  ago,  of  a  large  fleet  of 
clippers  moored  along  the  north  side  of  the 
New  South  Dock  was  an  inspiring  spectacle. 
Then  there  was  a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  them, 
from  the  iron  dockyard  -  gates  guarded  by 
policemen,  in  a  long,  forest-like  perspective 
of  masts,  moored  two  and  two  to  many 
196 


In  Captivity 

stout  wooden  jetties.  Their  spars  dwarfed 
with  their  loftiness  the  corrugated-iron  sheds, 
their  jib-booms  extended  far  over  the  shore, 
their  white-and-gold  figure-heads,  almost  daz- 
zling in  their  purity,  overhung  the  straight, 
long  quay  above  the  mud  and  dirt  of  the 
wharf-side,  with  the  dwarfed  figures  of  groups 
and  single  men  moving  to  .and  fro,  rest- 
less and  grimy  under  their  soaring  immo- 
bility. 

At  tide-time  you  would  see  one  of  the 
loaded  ships  with  battened-down  hatches 
drop  out  of  the  ranks  and  float  in  the  clear 
space  of  the  dock,  held  by  lines  dark  and 
slender,  like  the  first  threads  of  a  spider's 
web,  extending  from  her  bows  and  her 
quarters  to  the  mooring  -  posts  on  shore. 
There,  graceful  and  still,  like  a  bird  ready  to 
spread  its  wings,  she  waited  till,  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  gates,  a  tug  or  two  would  hurry 
in  noisily,  hovering  round  her  with  an  air  of 
fuss  and  solicitude,  and  take,,  her  out  into 
the  river,  tending,  shepherding  her  through 
open  bridges,  through  dam -like  gates  be- 
tween the  flat  pier -heads,  with  a  bit  of 
green  lawn  surrounded  by  gravel  and  a 
197 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

white  signal-mast  with  yard  and  gaff,  fly- 
ing a  couple  of  dingy  blue,  red,  or  white 
flags. 

This  New  South  Dock  (it  was  its  official 
name),  round  which  my  earlier  professional 
memories  are  centred,  belongs  to  the  group 
of  West  India  Docks,  together  with  two 
smaller  and  much  older  basins  called  Im- 
port and  Export  respectively,  both  with  the 
greatness  of  their  trade  departed  from  them 
already.  Picturesque  and  clean  as  docks  go, 
these  twin  basins  spread  side  by  side  the 
dark  lustre  of  their  glassy  water,  sparely 
peopled  by  a  few  ships  laid  up  on  buoys 
or  tucked  far  away  from  one  another  at  the 
end  of  sheds  in  the  corners  of  empty  quays, 
where  they  seemed  to  slumber  quietly  re- 
mote, untouched  by  the  bustle  of  men's 
affairs — in  retreat  rather  than  in  captivity. 
They  were  quaint  and  sympathetic,  those 
two  homely  basins,  unfurnished  and  silent, 
with  no  aggressive  display  of  cranes,  no  ap- 
paratus of  hurry  and  work  on  their  narrow 
shores.  No  railway  lines  cumbered  them. 
The  knots  of  laborers  trooping  in  clumsily 
round  the  corners  of  cargo-sheds  to  eat  their 
198 


In  Captivity 

food  in  peace  out  of  red  cotton  handkerchiefs 
had  the  air  of  picnicking  by  the  side  of  a 
lonely  mountain  pool.  They  were  restful 
(and  I  should  say  very  unprofitable),  those 
basins,  where  the  chief  officer  of  one  of  the 
ships  involved  in  the  harassing,  strenuous, 
noisy  activity  of  the  New  South  Dock  only 
a  few  yards  away  could  escape  in  the  din- 
ner-hour to  stroll,  unhampered  by  men  and 
affairs,  meditating  (if  he  chose)  on  the 
vanity  of  all  things  human.  At  one  time 
they  must  have  been  full  of  good,  old,  slow 
West  Indiamen  of  the  square-stern  type, 
that  took  their  captivity,  one  imagines,  as 
stolidly  as  they  had  faced  the  buffeting  of 
the  waves  with  their  blunt,  honest  frows, 
and  disgorged  sugar,  rum,  molasses,  coffee, 
or  logwood  sedately  with  their  own  winch 
and  tackle.  But  when  I  knew  them,  of  ex- 
ports there  was  never  a  sign  that  one  could 
detect ;  and  all  the  imports  I  have  ever  seen 
were  some  rare  cargoes  of  tropical  timber, 
enormous  balks  roughed  out  of  iron  trunks 
grown  in  the  woods  about  the  Gulf  of 
Mexico.  They  lay  piled  up  in  stacks  of 
mighty  boles,  and  it  was  hard  to  believe 
199 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

that  all  this  mass  of  dead  and  stripped  trees 
had  come  out  of  the  flanks  of  a  slender,  in- 
nocent -  looking  little  bark  with,  as  likely 
as  not,  a  homely  woman's  name — Ellen  this 
or  Annie  that — upon  her  fine  bows.  But 
this  is  generally  the  case  with  a  discharged 
cargo.  Once  spread  at  large  over  the  quay, 
it  looks  the  most  impossible  bulk  to  have 
all  come  there  out  of  that  ship  along- 
side. 

They  were  quiet,  serene  nooks  in  the  busy 
world  of  docks,  these  basins  where  it  has 
never  been  my  good  luck  to  get  a  berth 
after  some  more  or  less  arduous  passage. 
But  one  could  see  at  a  glance  that  men  and 
ships  were  never  hustled  there.  They  were 
so  quiet  that,  remembering  them  well,  one 
comes  to  doubt  that  they  ever  existed — 
places  of  repose  for  tired  ships  to  dream  in, 
places  of  meditation  rather  than  work, 
where  wicked  ships — the  cranky,  the  lazy, 
the  wet,  the  bad  sea-boats,  the  wild  steerers, 
the  capricious,  the  pig-headed,  the  generally 
ungovernable — would  have  full  leisure  to 
take  count  and  repent  of  their  sins,  sorrow- 
ful and  naked,  with  their  rent  garments  of 
200 


In  Captivity 

sail-cloth  stripped  off  them  and  with  the 
dust  and  ashes  of  the  London  atmosphere 
upon  their  mast-heads.  For  that  the  worst 
of  ships  would  repent  if  she  were  ever  given 
time  I  make  no  doubt.  I  have  known  too 
many  of  them.  No  ship  is  wholly  bad ;  and 
now  that  their  bodies  that  had  braved  so 
many  tempests  have  been  blown  off  the  face 
of  the  sea  by"  a  puff  of  steam,  the  evil  and 
the  good  together  into  the  limbo  of  things 
that  have  served  their  time,  there  can  be 
no  harm  in  affirming  that  in  these  van- 
ished generations  of  willing  servants  there 
never  has  been  one  utterly  unredeemable 
soul. 

In  the  New  South  Dock  there  was  cer- 
tainly no  time  for  remorse,  introspection, 
repentance,  or  any  phenomena  of  inner  life 
either  for  the  captive  ships  or  for  their  offi- 
cers. From  six  in  the  morning  till  six  at 
night  the  hard  labor  of  the  prison-house, 
which  rewards  the  valiance  of  ships  that  win 
the  harbor,  went  on  steadily,  great  slings  of 
general  cargo  swinging  over  the  rail,  to  drop 
plumb  into  the  hatchways  at  the  sign  of  the 
gangway-tender's    hand.     The    New    South 

201 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Dock  was  especially  a  loading  dock  for  the 
colonies  in  those  great  (and  last)  days  of 
smart  wool-clippers,  good  to  look  at  and — 
well — exciting  to  handle.  Some  of  them 
were  more  fair  to  see  than  the  others ;  many 
were  (to  put  it  mildly)  somewhat  over- 
masted; all  were  expected  to  make  good 
passages ;  and  of  all  that  line  of  ships,  whose 
rigging  made  a  thick,  enormous  net  -  work 
against  the  sky,  whose  brasses  flashed  al- 
most as  far  as  the  eye  of  the  policeman  at 
the  gates  could  reach,  there  was  hardly  one 
that  knew  of  any  other  port  among  all  the 
ports  on  the  wide  earth  but  London  and 
Sydney,  or  London  and  Melbourne,  or  Lon- 
don and  Adelaide,  perhaps  with  Hobart 
Town  added  for  those  of  smaller  tonnage. 
One  could  almost  have  believed,  as  her  gray- 
whiskered  second  mate  used  to  say  of  the 

old  Duke  of  S ,  that  they  knew  the  road 

to  the  antipodes  better  than  their  own 
skippers,  who,  year  in,  year  out,  took  them 
from  London  —  the  place  of  captivity  — 
to  some  Australian  port  where,  twenty- 
five  years  ago,  though  moored  well  and 
tight  enough  to  the  wooden  wharves,  they 
202 


In  Captivity 

felt   themselves   no   captives,  but  honored 
guests. 


These  towns  of  the  antipodes,  not  so 
great  then  as  they  are  now,  took  an  interest 
in  the  shipping,  the  running  links  with 
"home,"  whose  numbers  confirmed  the 
sense  of  their  growing  importance.  They 
made  it  part  and  parcel  of  their  daily  in- 
terests. This  was  especially  the  case  in 
Sydney,  where,  from  the  heart  of  the  fair 
city,  down  the  vista  of  important  streets, 
could  be  seen  the  wool-clippers  lying  at  the 
Circular  Quay — no  walled  prison-house  of  a 
dock  that,  but  the  integral  part  of  one  of 
the  finest,  most  beautiful,  vast,  and  safe 
bays  the  sun  ever  shone  upon.  Now  great 
steam-liners  lie  at  these  berths,  always  re- 
served for  the  sea  aristocracy — grand  and 
imposing  enough  ships,  but  here  to-day  and 
gone  next  week;  whereas  the  general  cargo, 
emigrant,  and  passenger  clippers  of  my 
time,  rigged  with  heavy  spars,  and  built  on 
fine  lines,  used  to  remain  for  months  to- 

M  203 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

gether  waiting  for  their  load  of  wool.  Their 
names  attained  the  dignity  of  household 
words.  On  Sundays  and  holidays  the  citi- 
zens trooped  down,  on  visiting  bent,  and  the 
lonely  officer  on  duty  solaced  himself  by 
playing  the  cicerone — especially  to  the  citi- 
zenesses  with  engaging  manners  and  a  well- 
developed  sense  of  the  fun  that  may  be  got 
out  of  the  inspection  of  a  ship's  cabins  and 
state-rooms.  The  tinkle  of  more  or  less  un- 
tuned cottage  pianos  floated  out  of  open 
stern  -  ports  till  the  gas  -  lamps  began  to 
twinkle  in  the  streets,  and  the  ship's  night- 
watchman,  coming  sleepily  on  duty  after 
his  unsatisfactory  day  slumbers,  hauled 
down  the  flags  and  fastened  a  lighted  lan- 
tern at  the  break  of  the  gangway.  The 
night  closed  rapidly  upon  the  silent  ships 
with  their  crews  on  shore.  Up  a  short, 
steep  ascent  by  the  King's  Head  pub., 
patronized  by  the  cooks  and  stewards  of  the 
fleet,  the  voice  of  a  man  crying  "Hot  sav- 
eloys!" at  the  end  of  George  Street,  where 
the  cheap  eating-houses  (sixpence  a  meal) 
were  kept  by  Chinamen  (Sun-kum-on's  was 
not  bad),  is  heard  at  regular  intervals.  I 
204 


In  Captivity 

have  listened  for  hours  to  this  most  perti- 
nacious peddler  (I  wonder  whether  he  is 
dead  or  has  made  a  fortune),  while  sitting 

on  the  rail  of  the  old  Duke  of  S (she's 

dead,  poor  thing!  a  violent  death  on  the 
coast  of  New  Zealand),  fascinated  by  the 
monotony,  the  regularity,  the  abruptness  of 
the  recurring  cry,  and  so  exasperated  at  the 
absurd  spell,  that  I  wished  the  fellow  would 
choke  himself  to  death  with  a  mouthful  of 
his  own  infamous  wares. 

A  stupid  job,  and  fit  only  for  an  old  man, 
my  comrades  used  to  tell  me,  to  be  th; 
night-watchman  of  a  captive  (though  hon- 
ored) ship.  And  generally  the  oldest  of  the 
able  seamen  in  a  ship's  crew  does  get  it. 
But  sometimes  neither  the  oldest  nor  any 
other  fairly  steady  seaman  is  forthcoming. 
Ships'  crews  had  the  trick  of  melting  away 
swiftly  in  those  days.  So,  probably  on  ac- 
count of  my  youth,  innocence,  and  pensive 
habits  (which  made  me  sometimes  dilatory 
in  my  work  about  the  rigging),  I  was  sud- 
denly nominated,  in  our  chief  mate  Mr. 
B 's  most  sardonic  tones,  to  that  en- 
viable situation.  I  do  not  regret  the  ex- 
205 


The   Mirror  of  the  Sea 

perience.  The  night  humors  of  the  town 
descended  from  the  street  to  the  water-side 
in  the  still  watches  of  the  night:  larrikins 
rushing  down  in  bands  to  settle  some  quarrel 
by  a  stand-up  fight,  away  from  the  police, 
in  an  indistinct  ring  half  hidden  by  piles  of 
cargo,  with  the  sounds  of  blows,  a  groan 
now  and  then,  the  stamping  of  feet,  and  the 
cry  of  "Time!"  rising  suddenly  above  the 
sinister  and  excited  murmurs;  night-prowl- 
ers, pursued  or  pursuing,  with  a  stifled 
shriek  followed  by  a  profound  silence,  or 
slinking  stealthily  alongside  like  ghosts,  and 
addressing  me  from  the  quay  below  in  mys- 
terious tones  with  incomprehensible  proposi- 
tions. The  cabmen,  too,  who  twice  a  week, 
on  the  night  when  the  A.  S.  N.  Company's 
passenger-boat  was  due  to  arrive,  used  to 
range  a  battalion  of  blazing  lamps  opposite 
the  ship,  were  very  amusing  in  their  way. 
They  got  down  from  their  perches  and  told 
one  another  impolite  stories  in  racy  language, 
every  word  of  which  reached  me  distinctly 
over  the  bulwarks  as  I  sat  smoking  on  the 
main-hatch.  On  one  occasion  I  had  an  hour 
or  so  of  a  most  intellectual  conversation 
206 


In  Captivity 

with  a  person  whom  I  could  not  see  dis- 
tinctly, a  gentleman  from  England,  he  said, 
with  a  cultivated  voice,  I  on  deck  and  he 
on  the  quay  sitting  on  the  case  of  a  piano 
(landed  out  of  our  hold  that  very  after- 
noon), and  smoking  a  cigar  which  smelled 
very  good.  We  touched,  in  our  discourse, 
upon  science,  politics,  natural  history,  and 
operatic  singers.  Then,  after  remarking 
abruptly,  "You  seem  to  be  rather  intelli- 
gent, my  man,"  he  informed  me  pointedly 
that  his  name  was  Mr.  Senior,  and  walked 
off  —  to  his  hotel,  I  suppose.  Shadows! 
Shadows!  I  think  I  saw  a  white  whisker  as 
he  turned  under  the  lamp-post.  It  is  a 
shock  to  think  that  in  the  natural  course  of 
nature  he  must  be  dead  by  now.  There  was 
nothing  to  object  to  in  his  intelligence  but  a 
little  dogmatism  maybe.  And  his  name  was 
Senior!    Mr.  Senior! 

The  position  had  its  drawbacks,  however. 
One  wintry,  blustering,  dark  night  in  July, 
as  I  stood  sleepily  out  of  the  rain  under  the 
crease  of  the  poop  something  resembling  an 
ostrich  dashed  up  the  gangway.  I  say  os- 
trich because  the  creature,  though  it  ran  on 
207 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

two  legs,  appeared  to  help  its  progress  by 
working  a  pair  of  short  wings ;  it  was  a  man, 
however,  only  his  coat,  ripped  up  the  back 
and  flapping  in  two  halves  about  his  head, 
gave  him  that  weird  and  fowl-like  appear- 
ance.- At  least,  I  suppose  it  was  his  coat, 
for  it  was  impossible  to  make  him  out  dis- 
tinctly. How  he  managed  to  come  so 
straight  upon  me,  at  speed  and  without  a 
stumble  over  a  strange  deck,  I  cannot  im- 
agine. He  must  have  been  able  to  see  in 
the  dark  better  than  any  cat.  He  over- 
whelmed me  with  panting  entreaties  to  let 
him  take  shelter  till  morning  in  our  fore- 
castle. Following  my  strict  orders,  I  re- 
fused his  request,  mildly  at  first,  in  a  sterner 
tone  as  he  insisted  with  growing  impudence. 

"For  God's  sake  let  me,  matey!  Some  of 
'em  are  after  me — and  I've  got  hold  of  a 
ticker  here." 

"You  clear  out  of  this!"  I  said. 

"Don't  be  hard  on  a  chap,  old  man!"  he 
whined,  pitifully. 

"Now  then,  get  ashore  at  once.  Do  you 
hear?" 

Silence.  He  appeared  to  cringe,  mute,  as 
208 


' 


In  Captivity 


if  words  had  failed  him  through  grief,  then 
— bang!  came  a  concussion  and  a  great  flash 
of  light  in  which  he  vanished,  leaving  me 
prone  on  my  back  with  the .  miost  abomi- 
nable black  eye  that  anybody  ever  got  in 
the  faithful  discharge  of  duty.  Shadows! 
Shadows!  I  hope  he  escaped  the  enemies 
he  was  fleeing  from  to  live  and  flourish  to 
this  day.  But  his  fist  was  uncommonly 
hard  and  his  aim  miraculously  true  in  the 
dark. 

There  were  other  experiences,  less  painful 
and  more  funny  for  the  most  part,  with  one 
among  them  of  a  dramatic  complexion;  but 
the  greatest  experience  of  them  all  was  Mr. 
B ,  our  chief  mate  himself. 

He  used  to  go  ashore  every  night  to  fore- 
gather in  some  hotel's  parlor  with  his  crony, 
the  mate  of  the  bark  Cicero,  lying  on  the 
other  side  of  the  Circular  Quay.  Late  at 
night  I  would  hear  from  afar  their  stumbling 
footsteps  and  their  voices  raised  in  endless 
argument.  The  mate  of  the  Cicero  was  see- 
ing his  friend  on  board.  They  would  con- 
tinue their  senseless  and  muddled  discourse 
in  tones  of  profound  friendship  for  half  an 
209 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

hour  or  so  at  the  shore  end  of  our  gangway, 

and  then  I  would  hear  Mr.  B— insisting 

that  he  must  see  the  other  on  board  his  ship. 
And  away  they  would  go,  their  voices,  still 
conversing  with  excessive  amity,  being  heard 
moving  all  round  the  harbor.  It  happened 
more  than  once  that  they  would  thus  per- 
ambulate three  or  four  times  the  distance, 
each  seeing  the  other  on  board  his  ship  out 
of  pure  and  disinterested  affection.  Then, 
through  sheer  weariness,  or  perhaps  in  a 
moment  of  forgetfulness,  they  would  man- 
age to  part  from  each  other  somehow,  and 
by-and-by  the  planks  of  our  long  gangway 
would  bend  and  creak  under  the  weight  of 
Mr.  B coming  on  board  for  good  at  last. 

On  the  rail  his  burly  form  would  stop  and 
stand  swaying. 

"  Watchman!" 

"Sir." 

A  pause. 

He  waited  for  a  moment  of  steadiness  be- 
fore negotiating  the  three  steps  of  the  inside 
ladder  from  rail  to  deck ;  and  the  watchman, 
taught  by  experience,  would  forbear  offering 
help  which  would  be  received  as  an  insult  at 
210 


In  Captivity 

that  particular  stage  of  the  mate's  return. 
But  many  times  I  trembled  for  his  neck. 
He  was  a  heavy  man. 

Then  with  a  rush  and  a  thump  it  would  be 
done.  He  never  had  to  pick  himself  up; 
but  it  took  him  a  minute  or  so  to  pull  him- 
self together  after  the  descent. 

"Watchman!" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Captain  aboard?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

Pause. 

"Dog  aboard?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

Pause. 

Our  dog  was  a  gaunt  and  unpleasant 
beast,  more  like  a  wolf  in  poor  health  than 

a  dog,  and  I  never  noticed  Mr.  B at  any 

other  time  show  the  slightest  interest  in  the 
doings  of  the  animal.  But  that  question 
never  failed. 

"  Let's  have  your  arm  to  steady  me  along. " 

I  was  always  prepared  for  that  request. 
He  leaned  on  me  heavily  till  near  enough 
the  cabin  door  to  catch  hold  of  the  handle. 
Then  he  would  let  go  my  arm  at  once. 

211 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

"That  '11  do.     I  can  manage  now." 

And  he  could  manage.  He  could  manage 
to  find  his  way  into  his  berth,  light  his  lamp, 
get  into  his  bed — ay,  and  get  out  of  it  when 
I  called  him  at  half-past  five,  the  first  man 
on  deck,  lifting  the  cup  of  morning  coffee  to 
his  lips  with  a  steady  hand,  ready  for  duty 
as  though  he  had  virtuously  slept  ten  solid 
hours — a  better  chief  officer  than  many  a 
man  who  had  never  tasted  grog  in  his  life. 
He  could  manage  all  that,  but  could  never 
manage  to  get  on  in  life. 

Only  once  he  failed  to  catch  hold  of  the 
cabin -door  handle  at  the  first  grab.  He 
wraited  a  little,  tried  again,  and  again  failed. 
His  weight  was  growing  heavier  on  my  arm. 
He  sighed  slowly. 

"D— n  that  handle!" 

Without  letting  go  his  hold  of  me  he  turn- 
ed about,  his  face  lit  up  bright  as  day  by  the 
full  moon. 

"I  wish  she  were  out  at  sea,"  he  growled, 
savagely. 

"Yes,  sir." 

I  felt  the  need  to  say  something,  because 
he  hung  on  to  me  as  if  lost,  breathing  heavily. 
212 


In  Captivity 

"Ports  are  no  good — ships  rot,  men  go  to 
the  devil!" 

I  kept  still,  and  after  a  while  he  repeated 
with  a  sigh: 

"I  wish  she  were  at  sea  out  of  this." 

"So  do  I,  sir,"  I  ventured. 

Holding  my  shoulder,  he  turned  upon  me. 

"You!  What's  that  to  you  where  she  is? 
You  don't— drink." 

And  even  on  that  night  he  "managed  it" 
at  last.  He  got  hold  of  the  handle.  But 
he  did  not  manage  to  light  his  lamp  (I  don't 
think  he  even  tried),  though  in  the  morning 
as  usual  he  was  the  first  on  deck,  bull- 
necked,  curly-headed,  watching  the  hands 
turn-to  with  his  sardonic  expression  and  un- 
flinching gaze. 

I  met  him  ten  years  afterwards,  casually, 
unexpectedly,  in  the  street,  on  coming  out 
of  my  consignee  office.  I  was  not  likely  to 
have  forgotten  him  with  his  "I  can  manage 
now."  He  recognized  me  at  once,  remem- 
bered my  name,  and  in  what  ship  I  had 
served  under  his  orders.  He  looked  me 
over  from  head  to  foot. 

"What  are  you  doing  here?"  he  asked. 
213 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

"I  am  commanding  a  little  bark,"  I  said, 
"  loading  here  for  Mauritius. ' '  Then,  thought- 
lessly, I  added:  "And  what  are  you  doing, 
Mr.  B ?" 

"I,"  he  said,  looking  at  me  unflinchingly, 
with  his  old  sardonic  grin,  "I  am  looking 
for  something  to  do." 

I  felt  I  would  rather  have  bitten  out  my 
tongue.  His  jet-black,  curly  hair  had  turn- 
ed iron-gray;  he  was  scrupulously  neat  as 
ever,  but  frightfully  threadbare.  His  shiny 
boots  were  worn  down  at  heel.  But  he  for- 
gave me,  and  we  drove  off  together  in  a 
hansom  to  dine  on  board  my  ship.  He  went 
over  her  conscientiously,  praised  her  heartily, 
congratulated  me  on  my  command  with  ab- 
solute sincerity.  At  dinner,  as  I  offered  him 
wine  and  beer  he  shook  his  head,  and  as  I 
sat  looking  at  him  interrogatively,  muttered 
in  an  undertone : 

"I've  given  up  all  that." 

After  dinner  we  came  again  on  deck.  It 
seemed' as  though  he  could  not  tear  himself 
away  from  the  ship.  We  were  fitting  some 
new  lower  rigging,  and  he  hung  about,  ap- 
proving, suggesting,  giving  me  advice  in  his 
214 


In  Captivity 

old  manner.  Twice  he  addressed  me  as 
''My  boy,"  and  corrected  himself  quickly  to 
" Captain.' '  My  mate  was  about  to  leave 
me  (to  get  married),  but  I  concealed  the  fact 

from  Mr.  B .     I  was  afraid  he  would  ask 

me  to  give  him  the  berth  in  some  ghastly 
jocular  hint  that  I  could  not  refuse  to  take. 
I  was  afraid.  It  would  have  been  impos- 
sible.    I  could-  not  have  given  orders  to  Mr. 

B ,  and  I  am  sure  he  would  not  have 

taken  them  from  me  very  long.  He  could 
not  have  managed  that,  though  he  had  man- 
aged to  break  himself  from  drink — too  late. 

He  said  good-bye  at  last.  As  I  watched 
his  burly,  bull-necked  figure  walk  away  up 
the  street,  I  wondered  with  a  sinking  heart 
whether  he  had  much  more  than  the  price  of 
a  night's  lodging  in  his  pocket.  And  I  un- 
derstood that  if  that  very  minute  I  were  to 
call  out  after  him,  he  would  not  even  turn  his 
head.  He,  too,  is  no  more  than  a  shadow, 
but  I  seem  to  hear  his  words  spoken  on  the 
moonlit  deck  of  the  old  Duke  of  S : 

"Ports  are  no  good — ships  rot,  men  go  to 
the  devil!" 


Initiation 


|HIPS!"  exclaimed  an  elderly 
seaman  in  clean,  shore  togs. 
"Ships!" — and  his  keen  glance, 
turning  away  from  my  face, 
ran  along  the  vista  of  magnifi- 
cent figure-heads  that  in  the  late  seventies 
used  to  overhang  in  a  serried  rank  the 
muddy  pavement  by  the  side  of  the  New- 
South  Dock — "ships  are  all  right;  it's  the 
men  in  'em.  .  .  ." 

Fifty  hulls,  at  least,  moulded  on  lines  of 
beauty  and  speed — hulls  of  wood,  of  iron, 
expressing  in  their  forms  the  highest  achieve- 
ment of  modern  ship-building — lay  moored 
all  in  a  row,  stem  to  quay,  as  if  assembled 
there  for  an  exhibition,  not  of  a  great  in- 
dustry, but  of  a  great  art.  Their  colors 
were  gray,  black,  dark-green,  with  a  narrow 
strip  of  yellow  moulding  defining  their  sheer, 
216 


Initiation 

or  with  a  row  of  painted  ports  decking  in 
warlike  decoration  their  robust  flanks  of 
cargo-carriers  that  would  know  no  triumph 
but  of  speed  in  carrying  a  burden,  no  glory 
other  than  of  a  long  service,  no  victory  but 
that  of  an  endless,  obscure  contest  with  the 
sea.  The  great  empty  hulls  with  swept 
holds,  just  out  of  dry-dock,  with  their  paint 
glistening  freshly,  sat  high-sided  with  pon- 
derous dignity  alongside  the  wooden  jetties, 
looking  more  like  unmovable  buildings  than 
things  meant  to  go  afloat ;  others,  half  load- 
ed, far  on  the  way  to  recover  the  true  sea- 
physiognomy  of  a  ship  brought  down  to  her 
load-line,  looked  more  accessible.  Their  less 
steeply  slanting  gangways  seemed  to  invite 
the  strolling  sailors  in  search  of  a  berth  to 
walk  on  board  and  try  "for  a  chance"  with 
the  chief  mate,  the  guardian  of  a  ship's  effi- 
ciency. As  if  anxious  to  remain  unper- 
ceived  among  their  overtopping  sisters,  two 
or  three  "finished"  ships  floated  low,  with 
an  air  of  straining  at  the  leash  of  their  level 
headfasts,  exposing  to  view  their  cleared 
decks  and  covered  hatches,  prepared  to  drop 
stern  first  out  of  the  laboring  ranks,  display- 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

ing  the  true  comeliness  of  form  which  only 
her  proper  sea -trim  gives  to  a  ship.  And 
for  a  good  quarter  of  a  mile,  from  the  dock- 
yard-gate to  the  farthest  corner,  where  the 
old  housed-in  hulk,  the  President  (drill-ship 
then  of  the  Naval  Reserve),  used  to  lie  with 
her  frigate  side  rubbing  against  the  stone  of 
the  quay,  above  all  these  hulls,  ready  and 
unready,  a  hundred  and  fifty  lofty  masts, 
more  or  less,  held  out  the  web  of  their  rig- 
ging like  an  immense  net,  in  whose  close 
mesh,  black  against  the  sky,  the  heavy  yards 
seemed  to  be  entangled  and  suspended. 

It  was  a  sight.  The  humblest  craft  that 
floats  makes  its  appeal  to  a  seaman  by  the 
faithfulness  of  her  life;  and  this  was  the 
place  where  one  beheld  the  aristocracy  of 
ships.  It  was  a  noble  gathering  of  the  fair- 
est and  the  swiftest,  each  bearing  at  the 
bow  the  carved  emblem  of  her  name,  as  in 
a  gallery  of  plaster-casts,  figures  of  women 
with  mural  crowns,  women  with  flowing 
robes,  with  gold  fillets  on  their  hair  or  blue 
scarves  round  their  waists,  stretching  out 
rounded  arms  as  if  to  point  the  way;  heads 
of  men  helmeted  or  bare;  full  lengths  of 
218 


Initiation 

warriors,  of  kings,  of  statesmen,  of  lords  and 
princesses,  all  white  from  top  to  toe;  with 
here  and  there  a  dusky,  turbaned  figure,  be- 
dizened in  many  colors,  of  some  Eastern 
sultan  or  hero,  all  inclined  forward  under 
the  slant  of  mighty  bowsprits  as  if  eager  to 
begin  another  run  of  eleven  thousand  miles 
in  their  leaning  attitudes.  These  were  the 
fine  figure-heads  of  the  finest  ships  afloat. 
But  why,  unless  for  the  love  of  the  life  those 
effigies  shared  with,  us  in  their  wandering 
impassivity,  should  one  try  to  reproduce  in 
words  an  impression  of  whose  fidelity  there 
can  be  no  critic  and  no  judge,  since  such  an 
exhibition  of  the  art  of  ship-building  and 
the  art  of  figure-head  carving  as  was  seen 
from  year's  end  to  year's  end  in  the  open- 
air  gallery  of  the  New  South  Dock  no  man's 
eye  shall  behold  again?  All  that  patient, 
pale  company  of  queens  and  princesses,  of 
kings  and  warriors,  of  allegorical  women,  of 
heroines  and  statesmen  and  heathen  gods, 
crowned,  helmeted,  bareheaded,  has  run  for 
good  off  the  sea,  stretching  to  the  last  above 
the  tumbling  foam  their  fair,  rounded  arms, 
holding  out  their  spears,  swords,  shields, 
l*  219 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

tridents  in  the  same  unwearied,  striving-for- 
ward pose.  And  nothing  remains  but  linger- 
ing perhaps  in  the  memory  of  a  few  men,  the 
sound  of  their  names,  vanished  a  long  time 
ago  from  the  first  page  of  the  great  London 
dailies;  from  big  posters  in  railway  stations 
and  the  doors  of  shipping-offices;  from  the 
minds  of  sailors,  dock-masters,  pilots,  and 
tugmen;  from  the  hail  of  gruff  voices  and 
the  nutter  of  signal-flags  exchanged  between 
ships  closing  upon  each  other  and  drawing 
apart  in  the  open  immensity  of  the  sea. 

The  elderly,  respectable  seaman,  with- 
drawing his  gaze  from  that  multitude  of 
spars,  gave  me  a  glance  to  make  sure  of  our 
fellowship  in  the  craft  and  mystery  of  the 
sea.  We  had  met  casually,  and  had  got 
into  contact  as  I  had  stopped  near  him,  my 
attention  being  caught  by  the  same  peculi- 
arity he  was  looking  at  in  the  rigging  of  an 
obviously  new  ship,  a  ship  with  her  reputa- 
tion all  to  make  yet  in  the  talk  of  the  sea- 
men who  were  to  share  their  life  with  her. 
Her  name  was  already  on  their  lips.  I  had 
heard  it  uttered  between  two  thick,  red- 
necked fellows  of  the  semi  -  nautical  type 
220 


Initiation 

at  the  Fenchurch  Street  railway  station, 
where,  in  those  days,  the  every  -  day  male 
crowd  was  attired  in  jerseys  and  pilot-cloth 
mostly,  and  had  the  air  of  being  more  con- 
versant with  the  times  of  high-water  than 
with  the  times  of  the  trains.  I  had  noticed 
that  new  ship's  name  on  the  first  page  of 
my  morning  paper.  I  had  stared  at  the  un- 
familiar grouping  of  its  letters,  blue  on  white 
ground,  on  the  advertisement  boards,  when- 
ever the  train  came  to  a  stand-still  alongside 
one  of  the  shabby,  wooden,  wharf-like  plat- 
forms of  the  dock  railway  line.  She  had 
been  named,  with  proper  observances,  on 
the  day  she  came  off  the  stocks,  no  doubt, 
but  she  was  very  far  yet  from  "having  a 
name."  Untried,  ignorant  of  the  ways  of 
the  sea,  she  had  been  thrust  among  that  re- 
nowned company  of  ships  to  load  for  her 
maiden  voyage.  There  was  nothing  to 
vouch  for  her  soundness  and  the  worth  of 
her  character  but  the  reputation  of  the 
building  -  yard  whence  she  was  launched 
headlong  into  the  world  of  waters.  She 
looked  modest  to  me.  I  imagined  her  diffi- 
dent, lying  very  quiet,  with  her  side  nestling 

221 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

shyly  against  the  wharf  to  which  she  was 
made  fast  with  very  new  lines,  intimidated 
by  the  company  of  her  tried  and  experi- 
enced sisters  already  familiar  with  all  the 
violences  of  the  ocean  and  the  exacting  love 
of  men.  They  had  had  more  long  voyages 
to  make  their  names  in  than  she  had  known 
weeks  of  carefully  tended  life,  for  a  new  ship 
receives  as  much  attention  as  if  she  were  a 
young  bride.  Even  crabbed  old  dock-mas- 
ters look  at  her  with  benevolent  eyes.  In 
her  shyness  at  the  threshold  of  a  labori- 
ous and  uncertain  life,  where  so  much  is  ex- 
pected of  a  ship,  she  could  not  have  been 
better  heartened  and  comforted,  had  she 
only  been  able  to  hear  and  understand,  than 
by  the  tone  of  deep  conviction  in  which 
my  elderly,  respectable  seaman  repeated  the 
first    part    of   his    saying,    "Ships    are    all 

right " 

His  civility  prevented  him  from  repeating 
the  other,  the  bitter  part.  It  had  occurred 
to  him  that  it  was  perhaps  indelicate  to  in- 
sist. He  had  recognized  in  me  a  ship's  offi- 
cer, very  possibly  looking  for  a  berth  like 
himself,  and  so  far  a  comrade,  but  still  a 

222 


Initiation 

man  belonging  to  that  sparsely  peopled 
after-end  of  a  ship,  where  a  great  part  of 
her  reputation  as  a  "good  ship,"  in  sea- 
man's parlance,  is  made  or  marred. 

"Can  you  say  that  of  all  ships  without 
exception?"  I  asked,  being  in  an  idle  mood, 
because,  if  an  obvious  ship's  officer,  I  was 
not,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  down  at  the  docks 
to  "look  for  a  berth,"  an  occupation  as  en- 
grossing as  gambling,  and  as  little  favorable 
to  the  free  exchange  of  ideas,  besides  being 
destructive  of  the  kindly  temper  needed  for 
casual  intercourse  with  one's  fellow-creatures. 

"You  can  always  put  up  with  'em," 
opined  the  respectable  seaman  judicially. 

He  was  not  averse  from  talking,  either. 
If  he  had  come  down  to  the  dock  to  look 
for  a  berth,  he  did  not  seem  oppressed  by 
anxiety  as  to  his  chances.  He  had  the 
serenity  of  a  man  whose  estimable  character 
is  fortunately  expressed  by  his  personal  ap- 
pearance in  an  unobtrusive  yet  convincing 
manner  which  no  chief  officer  in  want  of 
hands  could  resist.  And,  true  enough,  I 
learned  presently  that  the  mate  of  the 
Hyperion  had  "taken  down"  his  name  for 
223 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

quartermaster.  "We  sign  on  Friday,  and 
join  next  day  for  the  morning  tide,"  he  re- 
marked, in  a  deliberate,  careless  tone,  which 
contrasted  strongly  with  his  evident  readi- 
ness to  stand  there  yarning  for  an  hour  or 
so  with  an  utter  stranger. 

"Hyperion"  I  said.  "I  don't  remember 
ever  seeing  that  ship  anywhere.  What  sort 
of  a  name  has  she  got?" 

It  appeared  from  his  discursive  answer 
that  she  had  not  much  of  a  name  one  way 
or  another.  She  was  not  very  fast.  It  took 
no  fool,  though,  to  steer  her  straight,  he  be- 
lieved. Some  years  ago  he  had  seen  her  in 
Calcutta,  and  he  remembered  being  told  by 
somebody  then  that  on  her  passage  up  the 
river  she  had  carried  away  both  her  hawse- 
pipes.  But  that  might  have  been  the 
pilot's  fault.  Just  now,  yarning  with  the 
apprentices  on  board,  he  had  heard  that 
this  very  voyage,  brought  up  in  the  Downs, 
outward-bound,  she  broke  her  sheer,  struck 
adrift,  and  lost  an  anchor  and  chain.  But 
that  might  have  occurred  through  want 
of  careful  tending  in  a  tideway.  All  the 
same,  this  looked  as  though  she  were  pretty 
224 


Initiation 

hard  on  her  ground-tackle.  Didn't  it  ?  She 
seemed  a  heavy  ship  to  handle,  anyway. 
For  the  rest,  as  she  had  a  new  captain  and  a 
new  mate  this  voyage,  he  understood,  one 
couldn't  say  how  she  would  turn  out.  .  .  . 

In  such  marine  shore-talk  as  this  is  the 
name  of  a  ship  slowly  established,  her  fame 
made  for  her,  the  tale  of  her  qualities  and 
of  her  defects  kept,  her  idiosyncrasies  com- 
mented upon  with  the  zest  of  personal  gos- 
sip, her  achievements  made  much  of,  her 
faults  glossed  over  as  things  that,  being 
without  remedy  in  our  imperfect  world, 
should  not  be  dwelt  upon  too  much  by  men 
who,  with  the  help  of  ships,  wrest  out  a 
bitter  living  from  the  rough  grasp  of  the 
sea.  All  that  talk  makes  up  her  "name," 
which  is  handed  over  from  one  crew  to  an- 
other without  bitterness,  without  animosity, 
with  the  indulgence  of  mutual  dependence, 
and  with  the  feeling  of  close  association  in 
the  exercise  of  her  perfections  and  in  the 
danger  of  her  defects. 

This  feeling  explains  men's  pride  in  ships. 
"Ships  are  all  right,"  as  my  middle-aged, 
respectable  quartermaster  said  with  much 
225 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

conviction  and  some  irony ;  but  they  are  not 
exactly  what  men  make  them.  They  have 
their  own  nature;  they  can  of  themselves 
minister  to  our  self-esteem  by  the  demand 
their  qualities  make  upon  our  skill  and  their 
shortcomings  upon  our  hardiness  and  en- 
durance. Which  is  the  more  flattering  ex- 
action it  is  hard  to  say ;  but  there  is  the  fact 
that  in  listening  for  upward  of  twenty  years 
to  the  sea-talk  that  goes  on  afloat  and 
ashore  I  have  never  detected  the  true  note 
of  animosity.  I  won't  deny  that  at  sea, 
sometimes,  the  note  of  profanity  was  audi- 
ble enough  in  those  chiding  interpellations 
a  wet,  cold,  weary  seaman  addresses  to  his 
ship,  and  in  moments  of  exasperation  is  dis- 
posed to  extend  to  all  ships  that  ever  were 
launched — to  the  whole  everlastingly  ex- 
acting brood  that  swims  in  deep  waters. 
And  I  have  heard  curses  launched  at  the 
unstable  element  itself,  whose  fascination, 
outlasting  the  accumulated  experience  of 
ages,  had  captured  him  as  it  had  captured 
the  generations  of  his  forebears. 

For  all  that  has  been  said  of  the  love  that 
certain  natures  (on  shore)  have  professed  to 
226 


Initiation 

^feel  for  it,  for  all  the  celebrations  it  Lad  been 
/  the  object  of  in  prose  and  song,  the  sea  has 
never  been  friendly  to  man.  At  most  it  has 
\  been  the  accomplice  of  human  restlessness, 
and  playing  the  part  of  dangerous  abettor  of 
world-wide  .ambitions.  Faithful  to  no  race 
after  the  manner  of  the  kindly  earth,  re- 
ceiving no  impress  from  valor  and  toil  and 
self-sacrifice,  recognizing  no  finality  of  do- 
minion, the  sea  has  never  adopted  the  cause 
of  its  masters  like  those  lands  where  the 
victorious  nations  of  mankind  have  taken 
root,  rocking  their  cradles  and  setting  up 
their  gravestones.  He  —  man  or  people  — 
who,  putting  his  trust  in  the  friendship  of 
the  sea,  neglects  the  strength  and  cunning 
of  his  right  hand,  is  a  fool!  As  if  it  were 
too  great,  too  mighty  for  common  virtues, 
the  ocean  has  no  compassion,  no  faith,  no 
law,  no  memory.  Its  fickleness  is  to  be  held 
true  to  men's  purposes  only  by  an  undaunt- 
ed resolution,  and  by  a  sleepless,  armed, 
jealous  vigilance,  in  which,  perhaps,  there 
has  always  been  more  hate  than  love.  Odi 
et  amo  may  well  be  the  confession  of  those 
who  consciously  or  blindly  have  surrendered 
227 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

their  existence  to  the  fascination  of  the  sea. 
All  the  tempestuous  passions  of  mankind's 
:  young  days,  the  love  of  loot  and  the  love  of 
glory,  the  love  of  adventure  and  the  love  of 
danger,  with  the  great  love  of  the  unknown 
and  vast  dreams  of  dominion  and  power, 
have  passed  like  images  reflected  from  a 
mirror,  leaving  no  record  upon  the  myste- 
rious face  of  the  sea.  Impenetrable  and 
heartless,  the  sea  has  given  nothing  of  itself 
to  the  suitors  for  its  precarious  favors.  Un- 
like the  earth,  it  cannot  be  subjugated  at 
any  cost  of  patience  and  toil.  For  all  its 
fascination  that  has  lured  so  many  to  a  vio- 
lent death,  its  immensity  has  never  been 
loved  as  the  mountains,  the  plains,  the 
desert  itself,  have  been  loved.  Indeed,  I 
suspect  that,  leaving  aside  the  protestations 
and  tributes  of  writers  who,  one  is  safe  in 
saying,  care  for  little  else  in  the  world  than 
the  rhythm  of  their  lines  and  the  cadence  of 
their  phrase,  the  love  of  the  sea,  to  which 
some  men  and  nations  confess  so  readily,  is 
a  complex  sentiment  wherein  pride  enters 
for  much,  necessity  for  not  a  little,  and  the 
love  of  ships— the  untiring  servants  of  our 
328 


Initiation 

hopes  and  our  self-esteem — for  the  best  and 
most  genuine  part.  For  the  hundreds  who 
have  reviled  the  sea,  beginning  with  Shake- 
speare in  the  line — 

11  More  fell  than  hunger,  anguish,  or  the  sea," 

down  to  the  last  obscure  sea-dog  of  the  "old 
model,"  having  but  few  words  and  still 
fewer  thoughts,  there  could  not  be  found,  I 
believe,  one  sailor  who  has  ever  coupled  a 
curse  with  the  good  or  bad  name  of  a  ship. 
If  ever  his  profanity,  provoked  by  the  hard- 
ships of  the  sea,  went  so  far  as  to  touch  his 
ship,  it  would  be  lightly,  as  a  hand  may, 
without  sin,  be  laid  in  the  way  of  kindness 
on  a  woman. 


The  love  that  is  given  to  ships  is  pro- 
foundly different  from  the  love  men  feel  for 
every  other  work  of  their  hands — the  love 
they  bear  to  their  houses,  for  instance — be- 
cause it  is  untainted  by  the  pride  of  posses- 
sion. The  pride  of  skill,  the  pride  of  re- 
229 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

sponsibihty,  the  pride  of  endurance  there 
may  be,  but  otherwise  it  is  a  disinterested 
sentiment.  No  seaman  ever  cherished  a 
ship,  even  if  she  belonged  to  him,  merely 
because  of  the  profit  she  put  in  his  pocket. 
No  one,  I  think,  ever  did;  for  a  ship-owner, 
even  of  the  best,  has  always  been  outside 
the  pale  of  that  sentiment  embracing  in  a 
feeling  of  intimate,  equal  fellowship  the  ship 
and  the  man,  backing  each  other  against 
the  implacable,  if  sometimes  dissembled, 
hostility  of  their  world  of  waters.  The  sea) 
— this  truth  must  be  confessed — has  no  gen- 
erosity. No  display  of  manly  qualities — 
courage,  hardihood,  endurance,  faithfulness 
— has  ever  been  known  to  touch  its  irre- 
sponsible consciousness  of  power.  The  ocean 
has  the  conscienceless  temper  of  a  savage 
autocrat  spoiled  by  much  adulation.  He 
cannot  brook  the  slightest  appearance  of  de- 
fiance, and  has  remained  the  irreconcilable 
enemy  of  ships  and  men  ever  since  ships  and 
men  had  the  unheard  of  audacity  to  go 
afloat  together  in  the  face  of  his  frown. 
From  that  day  he  has  gone  on  swallowing 
up  fleets  and  men  without  his  resentment 
230 


Initiation 

being  glutted  by  the  number  of  victims — by 
so  many  wrecked  ships  and  wrecked  lives. 
To-day,  as  ever,  he  is  ready  to  beguile  and 
betray,  to  smash  and  to  drown  the  incorri- 
gible optimism  of  men  who,  backed  by  the 
fidelity  of  ships,  are  trying  to  wrest  from 
him  the  fortune  of  their  house,  the  dominion 
of  their  world,  or  only  a  dole  of  food  for 
their  hunger.  .  If  not  always  in  the  hot 
mood  to  smash,  he  is  always  stealthily  ready 
for  a  drowning.  The  most  amazing  wonder 
of  the  deep  is  its  unfathomable  cruelty.    J 

I  felt  its  dread  for  the  first  time  in  mid- 
Atlantic  one  day,  many  years  ago,  when  we 
took  off  the  crew  of  a  Danish  brig  homeward- 
bound  from  the  West  Indies.  A  thin,  silvery 
mist  softened  the  calm  and  majestic  splendor 
of  light  without  shadows — seemed  to  render 
the  sky  less  remote  and  the  ocean  less  im- 
mense. It  was  one  of  the  days  when  the 
might  of  the  sea  appears  indeed  lovable,  like 
the  nature  of  a  strong  man  in  moments  of 
quiet  intimacy.  At  sunrise  we  had  made 
out  a  black  speck  to  the  westward,  appar- 
ently suspended  high  up  in  the  void  behind 
a  stirring,  shimmering  veil  of  silvery  blue 
231 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

gauze  that  seemed  at  times  to  stir  and  float 
in  the  breeze  which  fanned  us  slowly  along. 
The  peace  of  that  enchanting  forenoon  was 
so  profound,  so  untroubled,  that  it  seemed 
that  every  word  pronounced  loudly  on  our 
deck  would  penetrate  to  the  very  heart  of 
that  infinite  mystery  born  from  the  con- 
junction of  water  and  sky.  We  did  not 
raise  our  voices.  "A  water-logged  derelict, 
I  think,  sir,"  said  the  second  officer,  quietly, 
coming  down  from  aloft  with  the  binoculars 
in  their  case  slung  across  his  shoulders ;  and 
our  captain,  without  a  word,  signed  to  the 
helmsman  to  steer  for  the  black  speck. 
Presently  we  made  out  a  low,  jagged  stump 
sticking  up  forward — all  that  remained  of 
her  departed  masts. 

The  captain  was  expatiating  in  a  low,  con- 
versational tone  to  the  chief  mate  upon  the 
danger  of  these  derelicts,  and  upon  his 
dread  of  coming  upon  them  at  night,  when 
suddenly  a  man  forward  screamed  out, 
"There's  people  on  board  of  her,  sir!  I  see 
them!"  in  a  most  extraordinary  voice — a 
voice  never  heard  before  in  our  ship;  the 
amazing  voice  of  a  stranger.  It  gave  the 
232 


Initiation 

signal  for  a  sudden  tumult  of  shouts.  The 
watch  below  ran  up  the  forecastle  head  in  a 
body,  the  cook  dashed  out  of  the  galley. 
Everybody  saw  the  poor  fellows  now.  They 
were  there!  And  all  at  once  our  ship,  which 
had  the  well-earned  name  of  being  without 
a  rival  for  speed  in  light  winds,  seemed  to 
us  to  have  lost  the  power  of  motion,  as  if 
the  sea,  becoming  viscous,  had  clung  to 
her  sides.  And  yet  she  moved.  Immensity, 
the  inseparable  companion  of  a  ship's  life, 
chose  that  day  to  breathe  upon  her  as  gently 
as  a  sleeping  child.  The  clamor  of  our  ex- 
citement had  died  out,  and  our  living  ship, 
famous  for  never  losing  steerage  way  as  long 
as  there  was  air  enough  to  float  a  feather, 
stole,  without  a  ripple,  silent  and  white  as  a 
ghost,  towards  her  mutilated  and  wounded 
sister,  come  upon  at  the  point  of  death  in 
the  sunlit  haze  of  a  calm  day  at  sea. 

With  the  binoculars  glued  to  his  eyes,  the 
captain  said  in  a  quavering  tone:  "They  are 
waving  to  us  with  something  aft  there.' ' 
He  put  down  the  glasses  on  the  skylight 
brusquely,  and  began  to  walk  about  the 
poop.  "A  shirt  or  a  flag,"  he  ejaculated, 
233 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

irritably.  "Can't  make  it  out.  .  .  .  Some 
damn  rag  or  other !"  He  took  a  few  more 
turns  on  the  poop,  glancing  down  over  the 
rail  now  and  then  to  see  how  fast  we  were 
moving.  His  nervous  footsteps  rang  sharp- 
ly in  the  quiet  of  the  ship,  where  the  other 
men,  all  looking  the  same  way,  had  forgotten 
themselves  in  a  staring  immobility.  "This 
will  never  do!"  he  cried  out,  suddenly. 
"Lower  the  boats  at  once!  Down  with 
them!" 

Before  I  jumped  into  mine  he  took  me 
aside,  as  being  an  inexperienced  junior,  for 
a  word  of  warning. 

"You  look  out  as  you  come  alongside 
that  she  doesn't  take  you  down  with  her. 
You  understand?" 

He  murmured  this  confidentially,  so  that 
none  of  the  men  at  the  falls  should  overhear, 
and  I  was  shocked.  "Heavens!  as  if  in 
such  an  emergency  one  stopped  to  think  of 
danger!"  I  exclaimed  to  myself  mentally,  in 
scorn  of  such  cold-blooded  caution. 

It   takes   many  lessons   to   make  a  real 
seaman,    and    I    got    my  rebuke    at  once. 
My  experienced  commander  seemed  in  one 
234 


Initiation 

searching  glance  to  read  my  thoughts  on 
my  ingenuous  face. 

"  What  you're  going  for  is  to  save  life,  not 
to  drown  your  boat's  crew  for  nothing,"  he 
growled  severely  in  my  ear.  But  as  we 
shoved  off  he  leaned  over  and  cried  out: 
"It  all  rests  on  the  power  of  your  arms, 
men.     Give  way  for  life!" 

We  made  a  race  of  it,  and  I  would  never 
have  believed  that  a  common  boat's  crew  of 
a  merchantman  could  keep  up  so  much  de- 
termined fierceness  in  the  regular  swing  of 
their  stroke.  What  our  captain  had  clearly 
perceived  before  we  left  had  become  plain  to 
all  of  us  since.  The  issue  of  our  enterprise 
hung  on  a  hair  above  that  abyss  of  waters 
which  will  not  give  up  its  dead  till  the  Day 
of  Judgment.  It  was  a  race  of  two  ship's 
boats  matched  against  Death  for  a  prize  of 
nine  men's  lives,  and  Death  had  a  long  start. 
We  saw  the  crew  of  the  brig  from  afar 
working  at  the  pumps  —  still  pumping  on 
that  wreck,  which  already  had  settled  so 
far  down  that  the  gentle,  low  swell,  over 
which  our  boats  rose  and  fell  easily  without 
a  check  to  their  speed,  welling  up  almost 

x6  235 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

level  with  her  head-rails,  plucked  at  the 
ends  of  broken  gear  swinging  desolately  un- 
der her  naked  bowsprit. 

We  could  not,  in  all  conscience,  have 
picked  out  a  better  day  for  our  regatta  had 
we  had  the  free  choice  of  all  the  days  that 
ever  dawned  upon  the  lonely  struggles  and 
solitary  agonies  of  ships  since  the  Norse 
rovers  first  steered  to  the  westward  against 
the  run  of  Atlantic  waves.  It  was  a  very 
good  race.  At  the  finish  there  was  not  an 
oar's-  length  between  the  first  and  second 
boat,  with  Death  coming  in  a  good  third  on 
the  top  of  the  very  next  smooth  swell,  for 
all  one  knew  to  the  contrary.  The  scuppers 
of  the  brig  gurgled  softly  all  together  when 
the  water  rising  against  her  sides  subsided 
sleepily  with  a  low  wash,  as  if  playing  about 
an  immovable  rock.  Her  bulwarks  were 
gone  fore-and-aft,  and  one  saw  her  bare 
deck  low-lying  like  a  raft  and  swept  clean 
of  boats,  spars,  houses — of  everything  ex- 
cept the  ring-bolts  and  the  heads  of  the 
pumps.  I  had  one  dismal  glimpse  of  it  as 
I  braced  myself  up  to  receive  upon  my 
breast  the  last  man  to  leave  her,  the 
236 


Initiation 

captain,  who  literally  let  himself  fall  into 
my  arms. 

It  had  been  a  weirdly  silent  rescue — a 
rescue  without  a  hail,  without  a  single  ut- 
tered word,  without  a  gesture  or  a  sign, 
without  a  conscious  exchange  of  glances. 
Up  to  the  very  last  moment  those  on  board 
stuck  to  their  pumps,  which  spouted  two 
clear  streams  of  water  upon  their  bare  feet. 
Their  brown  skin  showed  through  the  rents 
of  their  shirts ;  and  the  two  small  bunches  of 
half-naked,  tattered  men  went  on  bowing 
from  the  waist  to  one  another  in  their  back- 
breaking  labor,  up  and  down,  absorbed, 
with  no  time  for  a  glance  over  the  shoulder 
at  the  help  that  was  coming  to  them.  As 
we  dashed,  unregarded,  alongside,  a  voice  let 
out  one,  only  one  hoarse  howl  of  command, 
and  then,  just  as  they  stood,  without  caps, 
with  the  salt  drying  gray  in  the  wrinkles 
and  folds  of  their  hairy,  haggard  faces, 
blinking  stupidly  at  us  their  red  eyelids, 
they  made  a  bolt  away  from  the  handles, 
tottering  and  jostling  against  one  another, 
and  positively  flung  themselves  over  upon 
our  very  heads.  The  clatter  they  made 
237 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

tumbling  into  the  boats  had  an  extraordi- 
narily destructive  effect  upon  the  illusion  of 
tragic  dignity  our  self-esteem  had  thrown 
over  the  contests  of  mankind  with  the  sea. 
On  that  exquisite  day  of  gently  breathing 
peace  and  veiled  sunshine  perished  my  ro- 
mantic love  to  what  men's  imagination  had 
proclaimed  the  most  august  aspect  of  nat- 
ure. The  cynical  indifference  of  the  sea  to 
the  merits  of  human  suffering  and  courage,  i 
laid  bare  in  this  ridiculous,  panic-tainted 
performance  extorted  from  the  dire  ex- f 
tremity  of  nine  good  and  honorable  seamen, 
revolted  me.  I  saw  the  duplicity  of  the 
sea's  most  tender  mood.  It  was  so  because 
it  could  not  help  itself,  but  the  awed  respect 
of  the  early  days  was  gone.  I  felt  ready  to 
smile  bitterly  at  its  enchanting  charm  and! 
glare  viciously  at  its  furies.  In  a  moment, 
before  we  shoved  off,  I  had  looked  coolly  at 
the  life  of  my  choice.  Its  illusions  were 
gone,  but  its  fascinations  remained.  I  had . 
become  a  seaman  at  last. 

We  pulled  hard  for  a  quarter  of  an  hour, 
then  laid  on  our  oars  waiting  for  our  ship. 
She  was  coming  down  on  us  with  swelling 
238 


Initiation 

sails,  looking  delicately  tall  and  exquisitely 
noble  through  the  mist.  The  captain  of  the 
brig,  who  sat  in  the  stern-sheets  by  my  side 
with  his  face  in  his  hands,  raised  his  head 
and  began  to  speak  with  a  sort  of  sombre 
volubility.  They  had  lost  their  masts  and 
sprung  a  leak  in  a  hurricane;  drifted  for 
weeks,  always  at  the  pumps,  met  more  bad 
weather;  the  ships  they  sighted  failed  to 
make  them  out,  the  leak  gained  upon  them 
slowly,  and  the  seas  had  left  them  nothing 
to  make  a  raft  of.  It  was  very  hard  to  see 
ship  after  ship  pass  by  at  a  distance,  "as  if 
everybody  had  agreed  that  we  must  be  left 
to  drown,"  he  added.  But  they  went  on 
trying  to  keep  the  brig  afloat  as  long  as  pos- 
sible, and  working  the  pumps  constantly  on 
insufficient  food,  mostly  raw,  till  ' '  yesterday 
evening,"  he  continued,  monotonously,  "just 
as  the  sun  went  down,  the  men's  hearts 
broke." 

He  made  an  almost  imperceptible  pause 
here,  and  went  on  again  with  exactly  the 
same  intonation: 

"They  told  me  the  brig  could  not  be 
saved,  and  they  thought  they  had  done 
239 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

enough  for  themselves.  I  said  nothing  to 
that.  It  was  true.  It  was  no  mutiny.  I 
had  nothing  to  say  to  them.  They  lay 
about  aft  all  night,  as  still  as  so  many  dead 
men.  I  did  not  lie  down.  I  kept  a  look- 
out. When  the  first  light  came  I  saw  your 
ship  at  once.  I  waited  for  more  light;  the 
breeze  began  to  fail  on  my  face.  Then  I 
shouted  out  as  loud  as  I  was  able,  "Look  at 
that  ship!"  but  only  two  men  got  up  very 
slowly  and  came  to  me.  At  first  only  we 
three  stood  alone,  for  a  long  time,  watching 
you  coming  down  to  us,  and  feeling  the 
breeze  drop  to  a  calm  almost;  but  after- 
wards others,  too,  rose,  one  after  another, 
and  by-and-by  I  had  all  my  crew  behind  me. 
I  turned  round  and  said  to  them  that  they 
could  see  the  ship  was  coming  our  way,  but 
in  this  small  breeze  she  might  come  too  late 
after  all,  unless  we  turned  to  and  tried  to 
keep  the  brig  afloat  long  enough  to  give  you 
time  to  save  us  all.  I  spoke  like  that  to 
them,  and  then  I  gave  the  command  to  man 
the  pumps.' ' 

He  gave  the  command,  and  gave  the  ex- 
ample, too,  by  going  himself  to  the  handles, 
240 


Initiation 

but  it  seems  that  these  men  did  actually 
hang  back  for  a  moment,  looking  at  one 
another  dubiously  before  they  followed  him. 
"He!  he!  he!"  He  broke  out  into  a  most 
unexpected,  imbecile,  pathetic,  nervous  little 
giggle.  ' '  Their  hearts  were  broken  so !  They 
had  been  played  with  too  long,"  he  explain- 
ed apologetically,  lowering  his  eyes,  and  be- 
came silent. 

Twenty  -  five  years  is  a  long  time  —  a 
quarter  of  a  century  is  a  dim  and  distant 
past;  but  to  this  day  I  remember  the  dark- 
brown  feet,  hands,  and  faces  of  two  of  these 
men  whose  hearts  had  been  broken  by  the 
sea.  They  were  lying  very  still  on  their 
sides  on  the  bottom  boards  between  the 
thwarts,  curled  up  like  dogs.  My  boat's 
crew,  leaning  over  the  looms  of  their  oars, 
stared  and  listened  as  if  at  the  play.  The 
master  of  the  brig  looked  up  suddenly  to 
ask  me  what  day  it  was. 

They  had  lost  the  date.  When  I  told 
him  it  was  Sunday,  the  2  2d,  he  frowned, 
making  some  mental  calculation,  then  nod- 
ded twice  sadly  to  himself,  staring  at  noth- 
ing. 

*4i 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

His  aspect  was  miserably  unkempt  and 
wildly  sorrowful.  Had  it  not  been  for  the 
unquenchable  candor  of  his  blue  eyes,  whose 
unhappy,  tired  glance  every  moment  sought 
his  abandoned,  sinking  brig,  as  if  it  could 
find  rest  nowhere  else,  he  would  have  ap- 
peared mad.  But  he  was  too  simple  to  go 
mad,  too  simple  with  that  manly  simplicity 
which  alone  can  bear  men  unscathed  in 
mind  and  body  through  an  encounter  with 
the  deadly  playfulness  of  the  sea  or  with  its 
less  abominable  fury. 

Neither  angry  nor  playful  nor  smiling,  it 
enveloped  our  distant  ship  growing  bigger 
as  she  neared  us,  our  boats  with  the  rescued 
men  and  the  dismantled  hull  of  the  brig  we 
were  leaving  behind,  in  the  large  and  placid 
embrace  of  its  quietness,  half -lost  in  the  fair 
haze,  as  if  in  a  dream  of  infinite  and  faithful 
clemency.  There  was  no  frown,  no  wrinkle 
on  its  face,  not  a  ripple.  And  the  run  of 
the  slight  swell  was  so  smooth  that  it  re- 
sembled the  graceful  undulation  of  a  piece 
of  shimmering  gray  silk  shot  with  tender 
green.  We  pulled  an  easy  stroke;  but 
when  the  master  of  the  brig,  after  a  glance 
242 


Initiation 

over  his  shoulder,  stood  up  with  a  low  ex- 
clamation, my  men  feathered  their  oars  in- 
stinctively, without  an  order,  and  the  boat 
lost  her  way. 

He  was  steadying  himself  on  my  shoulder 
with  a  strong  grip,  while  his  other  arm,  flung 
up  rigidly,  pointed  a  denunciatory  finger  at 
the  immense  tranquillity  of  the  ocean.  After 
his  first  exclamation,  which  stopped  the 
swing  of  our  oars,  he  made  no  sound,  but 
his  whole  attitude  seemed  to  cry  out  an  in- 
dignant "Behold!"  ...  I  could  not  imagine 
what  vision  of  evil  had  come  to  him.  I  was 
startled,  and  the  amazing  energy  of  his 
immobilized  gesture  made  my  heart  beat 
faster  with  the  anticipation  of  something 
monstrous  and  unsuspected.  The  stillness 
around  us  became  crushing. 

For  a  moment  the  succession  of  silky  un- 
dulations ran  on  innocently.  I  saw  each  of 
them  swell  up  the  misty  line  of  the  horizon, 
far,  far  away  beyond  the  derelict  brig,  and 
the  next  moment,  with  a  slight,  friendly  toss 
of  our  boat,  it  had  passed  under  us  and  was 
gone.  The  lulling  cadence  of  the  rise  and 
fall,  the  invariable  gentleness  of  this  irre- 
243 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

sistible  force,  the  great  charm  of  the  deep 
waters,  warmed  my  breast  deliciously,  like 
the  subtle  poison  of  a  love-potion.  But  all 
this  lasted  only  a  few  soothing  seconds  be- 
fore I  jumped  up,  too,  making  the  boat  roll 
like  the  veriest  landlubber. 

Something  startling,  mysterious,  hastily 
confused,  was  taking  place.  I  watched  it 
with  incredulous  and  fascinated  awe,  as 
one  watches  the  confused,  swift  movements 
of  some  deed  of  violence  done  in  the  dark. 
As  if  at  a  given  signal,  the  run  of  the 
smooth  undulations  seemed  checked  sudden- 
ly around  the  brig.  By  a  strange  optical  de- 
lusion the  whole  sea  appeared  to  rise  upon 
her  in  one  overwhelming  heave  of  its  silky 
surface,  where  in  one  spot  a  smother  of 
foam  broke  out  ferociously.  And  then  the 
effort  subsided.  It  was  all  over,  and  the 
smooth  swell  ran  on  as  before  from  the 
horizon  in  uninterrupted  cadence  of  motion, 
passing  under  us  wjth  a  slight,  friendly  toss 
of  our  boat.  Far  away,  where  the  brig  had 
been,  an  angry  white  stain  undulating  on 
the  surface  of  steely-gray  waters,  shot  with 
gleams  of  green,  diminished  swiftly,  without 
244 


Initiation 

a  hiss,  like  a  patch  of  pure  snow  melting  in 
the  sun.  And  the  great  stillness  after  this 
initiation  into  the  sea's  implacable  hate 
seemed  full  of  dread  thoughts  and  shadows 
of  disaster. 

"Gone!"  ejaculated  from  the  depths  of 
his  chest  my  bowman  in  a  final  tone.  He 
spat  in  his  hands,  and  took  a  better  grip  on 
his  oar.  The  captain  of  the  brig  lowered 
his  rigid  arm  slowly,  and  looked  at  our  faces 
in  a  solemnly  conscious  silence,  which  called 
upon  us  to  share  in  his  simple-minded,  mar- 
velling awe.  All  at  once  he  sat  down  by 
my  side,  and  leaned  forward  earnestly  at 
my  boat's  crew,  who,  swinging  together  in  a 
long,  easy  stroke,  kept  their  eyes  fixed  upon 
him  faithfully. 

"No  ship  could  have  done  so  well,"  he 
addressed  them  firmly,  after  a  moment  of 
strained  silence,  during  which  he  seemed 
with  trembling  lips  to  seek  for  words  fit  to 
bear  such  high  testimony.  "She  was  small, 
but  she  was  good.  I  had  no  anxiety.  She 
was  strong.  Last  voyage  I  had  my  wife 
and  two  children  in  her.  No  other  ship 
could  have  stood  so  long  the  weather  she 
245 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

had  to  live  through  for  days  and  days  be- 
fore we  got  dismasted  a  fortnight  ago.  She 
was  fairly  worn  out,  and  that's  all.  You 
may  believe  me.  She  lasted  under  us  for 
days  and  days,  but  she  could  not  last  for- 
ever. It  was  long  enough.  I  am  glad  it  is 
over.  No  better  ship  was  ever  left  to  sink 
at  sea  on  such  a  day  as  this." 

He  was  competent  to  pronounce  the  fu- 
nereal oration  of  a  ship,  this  son  of  ancient 
sea-folk,  whose  national  existence,  so  little 
stained  by  the  excesses  of  manly  virtues, 
had  demanded  nothing  but  the  merest  foot- 
hold from  the  earth.  By  the  merits  of  his 
sea-wise  forefathers  and  by  the  artlessness 
of  his  heart,  he  was  made  fit  to  deliver 
this  excellent  discourse.  There  was  nothing 
wanting  in  its  orderly  arrangement — neither 
piety  nor  faith,  nor  the  tribute  of  praise  due 
to  the  worthy  dead,  with  the  edifying  re- 
cital of  their  achievement.  She  had  lived, 
he  had  loved  her;  she  had  suffered,  and  he 
was  glad  she  was  at  rest.  It  was  an  excel- 
lent discourse.  And  it  was  orthodox,  too, 
in  its  fidelity  to  the  cardinal  article  of  a  sea- 
man's faith,  of  which  it  was  a  single-minded 
246 


Initiation 

confession.  "Ships  are  all  right.' '  They 
are.  They  who  live  with  the  sea  have  got 
to  hold  by  that  creed  first  and  last;  and  it 
came  to  me,  as  I  glanced  at  him  sideways, 
that  some  men  were  not  altogether  un- 
worthy in  honor  and  conscience  to  pro- 
nounce the  funereal  eulogium  of  a  ship's 
constancy  in  life  and  death. 

After  this,  sitting  by  my  side  with  his 
loosely  clasped  hands  hanging  between  his 
knees,  he  uttered  no  word,  made  no  move- 
ment till  the  shadow  of  our  ship's  sails  fell 
on  the  boat,  when,  at  the  loud  cheer  greeting 
the  return  of  the  victors  with  their  prize,  he 
lifted  up  his  troubled  face  with  a  faint  smile 
of  pathetic  indulgence.  This  smile  of  the 
worthy  descendant  of  the  most  ancient  sea- 
folk  whose  audacity  and  hardihood  had  left 
no  trace  of  greatness  and  glory  upon  the 
waters,  completed  the  cycle  of  my  initiation. 
There  was  an  infinite  depth  of  hereditary 
wisdom  in  its  pitying  sadness.  It  made  the 
hearty  bursts  of  cheering  sound  like  a  child- 
ish noise  of  triumph.  Our  crew  shouted 
with  immense  confidence — honest  souls!  As 
if  anybody  could  ever  make  sure  of  having 
247 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

prevailed  against  the  sea,  which  has  be- 
trayed so  many  ships  of  great  "name,"  so 
many  proud  men,  so  many  towering  ambi- 
tions of  fame,  power,  wealth,  greatness! 

As  I  brought  the  boat  under  the  falls  my 
captain,  in  high  good -humor,  leaned  over, 
spreading  his  red  and  freckled  elbows  on 
the  rail,  and  called  down  to  me  sarcastically, 
out  of  the  depths  of  his  cynic  philosopher's 
beard : 

"  So  you  have  brought  the  boat  back  after 
all,  have  you?', 

Sarcasm  was  "his  way,"  and  the  most 
that  can  be  said  for  it  is  that  it  was  natural. 
This  did  not  make  it  lovable.  But  it  is  de- 
corous and  expedient  to  fall  in  with  one's 
commander's  way.  "Yes.  I  brought  the 
boat  back  all  right,  sir,"  I  answered.  And 
the  good  man  believed  me.  It  was  not  for 
him  to  discern  upon  me  the  marks  of  my 
recent  initiation.  And  yet  I  was  not  ex- 
actly the  same  youngster  who  had  taken 
the  boat  away — all  impatience  for  a  race 
against  Death,  with  the  prize  of  nine  men's 
lives  at  the  end. 

Already  I  looked  with  other  eyes  upon 
248 


Initiation 

the  sea.  I  knew  it  capable  of  betraying  the 
generous  ardor  of  youth  as  implacably  as, 
indifferent  to  evil  and  good,  it  would  have 
betrayed  the  basest  greed  or  the  noblest 
heroism.  My  conception  of  its  magnani- 
mous greatness  was  gone.  And  I  looked 
upon  the  true  sea — the  sea  that  plays  with 
men  till  their  hearts  are  broken,  and  wears 
stout  ships  to.  death.  Nothing  can  touch 
the  brooding  bitterness  of  its  heart.  Open 
to  all  and  faithful  to  none,  it  exercises  its 
fascination  for  the  undoing  of  the  best.  To 
love  it  is  not  well.  It  knows  no  bond  of 
plighted  troth,  no  fidelity  to  misfortune,  to 
long  companionship,  to  long  devotion.  The 
promise  it  holds  out  perpetually  is  very 
great;  but  the  only  secret  of  its  possession 
is  strength,  strength — the  jealous,  sleepless 
strength  of  a  man  guarding  a  coveted  treas- 
ure within  his  gates.     „ 


The   Nursery  of  the  Craft 


[HE  cradle  of  over -sea  traffic 
and  of  the  art  of  naval  com- 
bats, the  Mediterranean,  apart 
from  all  the  associations  of  ad- 
venture and  glory,  the  common 
heritage  of  all  mankind,  makes  a  tender  ap- 
peal to  a  seaman.  It  has  sheltered  the  in- 
fancy of  his  craft.  He  looks  upon  it  as  a 
man  may  look  at  a  vast  nursery  in  an  old, 
old  mansion  where  innumerable  generations 
of  his  own  people  have  learned  to  walk.  I 
say  his  own  people  because,  in  a  sense,  all 
sailors  belong  to  one  family:  all  are  de- 
scended from  that  adventurous  and  shaggy 
ancestor  who,  bestriding  a  shapeless  log  and 
paddling  with  a  crooked  branch,  accom- 
plished the  first  coasting-trip  in  a  sheltered 
bay  ringing  with  the  admiring  howls  of  his 
tribe.  It  is  a  matter  of  regret  that  all  those 
250 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

brothers  in  craft  and  feeling,  whose  genera- 
tions have  learned  to  walk  a  ship's  deck  in 
that  nursery,  have  been  also  more  than  once 
fiercely  engaged  in  cutting  one  another's 
throats  there.  But  life,  apparently,  has 
such  exigencies.  Without  human  propensity 
to  murder  and  other  sorts  of  unrighteousness 
there  would  have  been  no  historical  heroism. 
It  is  a  consoling  reflection.  And  then,  if  one 
examines  impartially  the  deeds  of  violence, 
they  appear  of  but  small  consequence. 
From  Salamis  to  Actium,  through  Lepanto 
and  the  Nile  to  the  naval  massacre  of 
Navarino,  not  to  mention  other  armed  en- 
counters of  lesser  interest,  all  the  blood  he- 
roically spilled  into  the  Mediterranean  has 
not  stained  with  a  single  trail  of  purple  the 
deep  azure  of  its  classic  waters. 

Of  course,  it  may  be  argued  that  battles 
have  shaped  the  destiny  of  mankind.  The 
question  whether  they  have  shaped  it  well 
would  remain  open,  however.  But  it  would 
be  hardly  worth  discussing.  It  is  very 
probable  that,  had  the  battle  of '  Salamis 
never  been  fought,  the  face  of  the  world 
would  have  been  much  as  we  behold  it  now, 
«7  251 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

fashioned  by  the  mediocre  inspiration  and 
the  short-sighted  labors  of  men.  From  a 
long  and  miserable  experience  of  suffering, 
injustice,  disgrace  and  aggression  the  nations 
of  the  earth  are  mostly  swayed  by  fear — 
fear  of  the  sort  that  a  little  cheap  oratory 
turns  easily  to  rage,  hate,  and  violence.  In- 
nocent, guileless  fear  has  been  the  cause  of 
many  wars.  Not,  of  course,  the  fear  of  war 
itself,  which,  in  the  evolution  of  sentiments 
and  ideas,  has  come  to  be  regarded  at  last 
as  a  half -mystic  and  glorious  ceremony  with 
certain  fashionable  rites  and  preliminary  in- 
cantations, wherein  the  conception  of  its 
true  nature  has  been  lost.  To  apprehend 
the  true  aspect,  force,  and  morality  of  war 
as  a  natural  function  of  mankind  one  re- 
quires a  feather  in  the  hair  and  a  ring  in  the 
nose,  or,  better  still,  teeth  filed  to  a  point 
and  a  tattooed  breast.  Unfortunately,  a 
return  to  such  simple  ornamentation  is  im- 
possible. We  are  bound  to  the  chariot  of 
progress.  There  is  no  going  back;  and,  as 
bad  luck  would  have  it,  our  civilization, 
which  has  done  so  much  for  the  comfort 
and  adornment  of  our  bodies  and  the  eleva- 
^52 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

tion  of  our  minds,  has  made  lawful  killing 
frightfully  and  needlessly  expensive. 

The  whole  question  of  improved  arma- 
ments has  been  approached  by  the  govern- 
ments of  the  earth  in  a  spirit  of  nervous  and 
unreflecting  haste,  whereas  the  right  way 
was  lying  plainly  before  them,  and  had  only 
to  be  pursued  with  calm  determination. 
The  learned  -vigils  and  labors  of  a  certain 
class  of  inventors  should  have  been  rewarded 
with  honorable  liberality  as  justice  demand- 
ed; and  the  bodies  of  the  inventors  should 
have  been  blown  to  pieces  by  means  of  their 
own  perfected  explosives  and  improved 
weapons  with  extreme  publicity  as  the  com- 
monest prudence  dictated.  By  this  meth- 
od the  ardor  of  research  in  that  direction 
would  have  been  restrained  without  in- 
fringing the  sacred  privileges  of  science. 
For  the  lack  of  a  little  cool  thinking  in  our 
guides  and  masters  this  course  has  not  been 
followed,  and  a  beautiful  simplicity  has 
been  sacrificed  for  no  real  advantage.  A 
frugal  mind  cannot  defend  itself  from  con- 
siderable bitterness  when  reflecting  that  at 
the  battle  of  Actium  (which  was  fought  for 
253 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

no  less  a  stake  than  the  dominion  of  the 
world)  the  fleet  of  Octavianus  Caesar  and 
the  fleet  of  Antonius,  including  the  Egyptian 
division  and  Cleopatra's  galley  with  purple 
sails,  probably  cost  less  than  two  modern 
battle-ships,  or,  as  the  modern  naval  book- 
jargon  has  it,  two  naval  units.  But  no 
amount  of  lubberly  book- jargon  can  disguise 
a  fact  well  calculated  to  afflict  the  soul  of 
every  sound  economist.  It  is  not  likely 
that  the  Mediterranean  will  ever  behold  a 
battle  with  a  greater  issue;  but  when  the 
time  comes  for  another  historical  fight  its 
bottom  will  be  enriched  as  never  before  by 
a  quantity  of  jagged  scrap-iron,  paid  for  at 
pretty  nearly  its  weight  of  gold  by  the  de- 
luded populations  inhabiting  the  isles  and 
continents  of  this  planet. 


Happy  he  who,  like  Ulysses,  has  made  an 
adventurous  voyage;  and  there  is  no  such 
sea  for  adventurous  voyages  as  the  Mediter- 
ranean— the  inland  sea  which  the  ancients 
looked  upon  as  so  vast  and  so  full  of  won- 
2S4 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

ders.  And,  indeed,  it  was  terrible  and 
wonderful;  for  it  is  we  alone  who,  swayed 
by  the  audacity  of  our  minds  and  the 
tremors  of  our  hearts,  are  the  sole  arti- 
sans of  all  the  wonder  and  romance  of  the 
world. 

It  was  for  the  Mediterranean  sailors  that 
fair  -  haired  sirens  sang  among  the  black 
rocks  seething  in  white  foam  and  mysterious 
voices  spoke  in  the  darkness  above  the 
moving  wave — voices  menacing,  seductive, 
or  prophetic,  like  that  voice  heard  at  the 
beginning  of  the  Christian  era  by  the  master 
of  an  African  vessel  in  the  Gulf  of  Syrta, 
whose  calm  nights  are  full  of  strange  mur- 
murs and  flitting  shadows.  It  called  him 
by  name,  bidding  him  go  and  tell  all  men 
that  the  great  god  Pan  was  dead.  But  the 
great  legend  of  the  Mediterranean,  the 
legend  of  traditional  song  and  grave  history, 
lives,  fascinating  and  immortal,  in  our 
minds. 

The  dark  and  fearful  sea  of  the  subtle 

Ulysses's  wanderings,  agitated  by  the  wrath 

of  Olympian  gods,  harboring  on  its  isles  the 

fury  of  strange  monsters  and  the  wiles  of 

255  / 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

strange  women;  the  highway  of  heroes  and 
sages,  of  warriors,  pirates,  and  saints;  the 
workaday  sea  of  Carthaginian  merchants 
and  the  pleasure-lake  of  the  Roman  Caesars, 
claims  the  veneration  of  every  seaman  as 
the  historical  home  of  that  spirit  of  open 
defiance  against  the  great  waters  of  the 
earth  which  is  the  very  soul  of  his  calling. 
Issuing  thence  to  the  west  and  south,  as  a 
youth  leaves  the  shelter  of  his  parental 
house,  this  spirit  found  the  way  to  the  In- 
dies, discovered  the  coasts  of  a  new  con- 
tinent, and  traversed  at  last  the  immensity 
of  the  great  Pacific,  rich  in  groups  of  islands 
remote  and  mysterious,  like  the  constella- 
tions of  the  sky. 

The  first  impulse  of  navigation  took  its 
visible  form  in  that  tideless  basin  freed 
from  hidden  shoals  and  treacherous  cur- 
rents, as  if  in  tender  regard  for  the  infancy 
of  the  art.  The  steep  shores  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean favored  the  beginners  in  one  of  hu- 
manity's most  daring  enterprises,  and  the 
enchanting  inland  sea  of  classic  adventure 
has  led  mankind  gently  from  headknd  to 
headland,  from  bay  to  bay,  from  island  to 
256 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

island,  out  into  the  promise  of  world-wide 
oceans  beyond  the  Pillars  of  Hercules. 


The  charm  of  the  Mediterranean  dwells  in 
the  unforgettable  flavor  of  my  early  days, 
and  to  this  hour  this  sea,  upon  which  the 
Romans  alone  ruled  without  dispute,  has 
kept  for  me  the  fascination  of  youthful  ro- 
mance. The  very  first  Christmas  night  I 
ever  spent  away  from  land  was  employed  in 
running  before  a  Gulf  of  Lyons  gale,  which 
made  the  old  ship  groan  in  every  timber  as 
she  skipped  before  it  over  the  short  seas  un- 
til we  brought  her  to,  battered  and  out  of 
breath,  under  the  lee  of  Majorca,  where  the 
smooth  water  was  torn  by  fierce  cat's-paws 
under  a  very  stormy  sky. 

We — or,  rather,  they,  for  I  had  hardly 
had  two  glimpses  of  salt-water  in  my  life  till 
then — kept  her  standing  off  and  on  all  that 
day,  while  I  listened  for  the  first  time  with 
the  curiosity  of  my  tender  years  to  the  song 
of  the  wind  in  a  ship's  rigging.  The  mo- 
notonous and  vibrating  note  was  destined 
257 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

to  grow  into  the  intimacy  of  the  heart,  pass 
into  blood  and  bone,  accompany  the  thoughts 
and  acts  of  two  full  decades,  remain  to 
haunt  like  a  reproach  the  peace  of  the  quiet 
fireside,  and  enter  into  the  very  texture  of 
respectable  dreams  dreamed  safely  under  a 
roof  of  rafters  and  tiles.  The  wind  was 
fair,  but  that  day  we  ran  no  more. 

The  thing  (I  will  not  call  her  a  ship  twice 
in  the  same  half -hour)  leaked.  She  leaked 
fully,  generously,  overflowingly,  all  over — 
like  a  basket.  I  took  an  enthusiastic  part 
in  the  excitement  caused  by  that  last  in- 
firmity of  noble  ships,  without  concerning 
myself  much  with  the  why  or  the  wherefore. 
The  surmise  of  my  maturer  years  is  that, 
bored  by  her  interminable  life,  the  vener- 
able antiquity  was  simply  yawning  with 
ennui  at  every  seam.  But  at  the  time  I  did 
not  know;  I  knew  generally  very  little,  and 
least  of  all  what  I  was  doing  in  that  galere. 

I  remember  that,  exactly  as  in  the  comedy 
of  Moliere,  my  uncle  asked  the  precise 
question  in  the  very  words — not  of  my  con- 
fidential valet,  however,  but  across  great 
distances  of  land,  in  a  letter  whose  mocking 
258 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

but  indulgent  turn  ill  concealed  his  almost 
paternal  anxiety.  I  fancy  I  tried  to  convey 
to  him  my  (utterly  unfounded)  impression 
that  the  West  Indies  awaited  my  coming. 
I  had  to  go  there.  It  was  a  sort  of  mystic 
conviction — something  in  the  nature  of  a 
call.  But  it  was  difficult  to  state  intelli- 
gibly the  grounds  of  this  belief  to  that  man 
of  rigorous  logic,  if  of  infinite  charity. 

The  truth  must  have  been  that,  all  un- 
versed in  the  arts  of  the  wily  Greek,  the  de- 
ceiver of  gods,  the  lover  of  strange  women, 
the  evoker  of  blood  -  thirsty  shades,  I  yet 
longed  for  the  beginning  of  my  own  obscure 
"Odyssey,"  which,  as  was  proper  for  a 
modern,  should  unroll  its  wonders  and  ter- 
rors beyond  the  Pillars  of  Hercules.  The 
disdainful  ocean  did  not  open  wide  to  swal- 
low up  my  audacity,  though  the  ship,  the 
ridiculous  and  ancient  galere  of  my  folly, 
the  old,  weary,  disenchanted  sugar-wagon, 
seemed  extremely  disposed  to  open  out  and 
swallow  up  as  much  salt-water  as  she  could 
hold.  This,  if  less  grandiose,  would  have 
been  as  final  a  catastrophe. 

But  no  catastrophe  occurred.  I  lived  to 
259 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

watch  on  a  strange  shore  a  black  and  youth- 
ful Nausicaa,  with  a  joyous  train  of  at- 
tendant maidens,  carrying  baskets  of  linen 
to  a  clear  stream  overhung  by  the  heads  of 
slender  palm  -  trees.  The  vivid  colors  of 
their  draped  raiment  and  the  gold  of  their 
ear-rings  invested  with  a  barbaric  and  re- 
gal magnificence  their  figures,  stepping  out 
freely  in  a  shower  of  broken  sunshine.  The 
whiteness  of  their  teeth  was  still  more  daz- 
zling than  the  splendor  of  jewels  at  their 
ears.  The  shaded  side  of  the  ravine  gleamed 
with  their  smiles.  They  were  as  unabashed 
as  so  many  princesses,  but,  alas!  not  one  of 
them  was  the  daughter  of  a  jet-black  sover- 
eign. Such  was  my  abominable  luck  in  be- 
ing born  by  a  mere  hair-breadth  of  twenty- 
five  centuries  too  late  into  a  world  where 
kings  have  been  growing  scarce  with  scan- 
dalous rapidity,  while  the  few  who  remain 
have  adopted  the  uninteresting  manners 
and  customs  of  simple  millionaires.  0bvi7 
ously,  it  was  a  vain  hope  in  187-  to  see  the 
ladies  of  a  royal  household  walk  in  checkered 
sunshine,  with  baskets  of  linen  on  their 
heads,  to  the  banks  of  a  clear  stream  over- 
260 


The  Nursery  of  the  Craft 

hung  by  the  starry  fronds  of  palm-trees.  It 
was  a  vain  hope.  If  I  did  not  ask  myself 
whether,  limited  by  such  discouraging  im- 
possibilities, life  were  still  worth  living,  it 
was  only  because  I  had  then  before  me  sev- 
eral other  pressing  questions,  some  of  which 
have  remained  unanswered  to  this  day. 
The  resonant,  laughing  voices  of  these  gor- 
geous maidens  scared  away  the  multitude 
of  humming  -  birds,  whose  delicate  wings 
wreathed  with  the  mist  of  their  vibration 
the  tops  of  flowering  bushes. 

No,  they  were  not  princesses.  Their  un- 
restrained laughter  filling  the  hot,  fern-clad 
ravine  had  a  soulless  limpidity,  as  of  wild, 
inhuman  dwellers  in  tropical  woodlands. 
Following  the  example  of  certain  prudent 
travellers,  I  withdrew  unseen — and  returned, 
not  much  wiser,  to  the  Mediterranean,  the 
sea  of  classic  adventures. 


The    "Tremolino" 


|T  was  written  that  there,  in  the 
nursery  of  our  navigating  an- 
cestors, I  should  learn  to  walk 
in  the  ways  of  my  craft  and 
grow  in  the  love  of  the  sea, 
blind  as  young  love  often  is,  but  absorbing 
and  disinterested  as  all  true  love  must  be. 
I  demanded  nothing  from  it — not  even  ad- 
venture. In  this  I  showed,  perhaps,  more 
intuitive  wisdom  than  high  self-denial.  No 
adventure  ever  came  to  one  for  the  asking. 
He  who  starts  on  a  deliberate  quest  of  ad- 
venture goes  forth  but  to  gather  dead-sea 
fruit,  unless,  indeed,  he  be  beloved  of  the 
gods  and  great  among  heroes,  like  that  most 
excellent  cavalier  Don  Quixote  de  la  Mancha. 
By  us  ordinary  mortals  of  a  mediocre  animus 
that  is  only  too  anxious  to  pass  by  wicked 
giants  for  so  many  honest  windmills,  ad' 
262 


The  "Tremolino" 

ventures  are  entertained  like  visiting  angels. 
They  come  upon  our  complacency  unawares. 
As  unbidden  guests  are  apt  to  do,  they  often 
come  at  inconvenient  times.  And  we  are 
glad  to  let  them  go  unrecognized,  without 
any  acknowledgment  of  so  high  a  favor. 
After  many  years,  on  looking  back  from  the 
middle  turn  of  life's  way  at  the  events  of  the 
past,  which,  like  a  friendly  crowd,  seem  to 
look  sadly  after  us  hastening  towards  the 
Cimmerian  shore,  we  may  see  here  and 
there,  in  the  gray  throng,  some  figure  glow- 
ing with  a  faint  radiance,  as  though  it  had 
caught  all  the  light  of  our  already  crepuscu- 
lar sky.  And  by  this  glow  we  may  recognize 
the  faces  of  our  true  adventures,  of  the  once 
unbidden  guests  entertained  unawares  in 
our  young  days. 

If  the  Mediterranean,  the  venerable  (and 
sometimes  atrociously  ill  -  tempered)  nurse 
of  all  navigators,  was  to  rock  my  youth, 
the  providing  of  the  cradle  necessary  for 
that  operation  was  intrusted  by  fate  to  the 
most  casual  assemblage  of  irresponsible 
young  men  (all,  however,  older  than  my- 
self) that,  as  if  drunk  with  Provencal  sun- 
263 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

shine,  frittered  life  away  in  joyous  levity  on 
the  model  of  Balzac's  Histoire  des  Treize 
qualified  by  a  dash  of  romance  de  cape  et 

She  who  was  my  cradle  in  those  years 
hadbeen  built  on  the  river  of  Savona  by 
a  famous  builder  of  boats,  was  rigged  in 
Corsica  by  another  good  man,  and  was  de- 
scribed on  her  papers  as  a  "tartane"  of 
sixty  tons.  In  reality,  she  was  a  true 
balancelle,  with  two  short  masts  raking  for- 
ward and  two  curved  yards,  each  as  long  as 
her  hull ;  a  true  child  of  the  Latin  lake,  with 
a  spread  of  two  enormous  sails  resembling 
the  pointed  wings  on  a  sea-bird's  slender 
body,  and  herself,  like  a  bird  indeed,  skim- 
ming rather  than  sailing  the  seas. 

Her  name  was  the  Tremolino.  How  is 
this  to  be  translated?  The  Quiver  erf  What 
a  name  to  give  the  pluckiest  little  craft  that 
ever  dipped  her  sides  in  angry  foam!  I  had 
felt  her,  it  is  true,  trembling  for  nights  and 
days  together  under  my  feet,  but  it  was 
with  the  high-strung  tenseness  of  her  faith- 
ful courage.  In  her  short  but  brilliant 
career  she  has  taught  me  nothing,  but  she 
264 


The  "Tremolino" 

has  given  me  everything.  I  owe  to  her  the 
awakened  love  for  the  sea  that,  with  the 
quivering  of  her  swift  little  body  and  the 
humming  of  the  wind  under  the  foot  of  her 
lateen  sails,  stole  into  my  heart  with  a  sort 
of  gentle  violence,  and  brought  my  imagina- 
tion under  its  despotic  sway.  The  Tremo- 
lino! To  this  day  I  cannot  utter  or  even 
write  that  name  without  a  strange  tighten- 
ing of  the  breast  and  the  gasp  of  mingled 
delight  and  dread  of  one's  first  passionate 
experience. 


We  four  formed  (to  use  a  term  well  un- 
derstood nowadays  in  every  social  sphere)  a 
11 syndicate"  owning  the  Tremolino:  a  cos- 
mopolitan and  astonishing  syndicate.  And 
we  were  all  ardent  Royalists  of  the  snow- 
white  Legitimist  complexion — Heaven  only 
knows  why!  In  all  associations  of  men 
there  is  generally  one  who,  by  the  authority 
of  age  and  of  a  more  experienced  wisdom, 
imparts  a  collective  character  to  the  whole 
set.  If  I  mention  that  the  oldest  of  us  was 
265 


The  Mirror  of   the  Sea 

very  old,  extremely  old — nearly  thirty  years 
old — and  that  he  used  to  declare  with  gal- 
lant carelessness,  "I  live  by  my  sword,"  I 
think  I  have  given  enough  information  on 
the  score  of  our  collective  wisdom.  He  was 
a  North  Carolinian  gentleman,  J.  M.  K.  B. 
were  the  initials  of  his  name,  and  he  really 
did  live  by  the  sword,  as  far  as  I  know.  He 
died  by  it,  too,  later  on,  in  a  Balkanian 
squabble,  in  the  cause  of  some  Serbs  or  else 
Bulgarians,  who  were  neither  Catholics  nor 
gentlemen  —  at  least,  not  in  the  exalted 
but  narrow  sense  he  attached  to  that  last 
word. 

Poor  J.  M.  K.  B.,  Americain,  Catholique, 
et  gentilhomme,  as  he  was  disposed  to  de- 
scribe himself  in  moments  of  lofty  expan- 
sion! Are  there  still  to  be  found  in  Europe 
gentlemen  keen  of  face  and  elegantly  slight 
of  body,  of  distinguished  aspect,  with  a  fas- 
cinating drawing-room  manner  and  with  a 
dark,  fatal  glance,  who  live  by  their  swords, 
I  wonder?  His  family  had  been  ruined  in 
the  Civil  War,  I  fancy,  and  seems  for  a  dec- 
ade or  so  to  have  led  a  wandering  life  in 

the  Old  World.     As  to  Henry  C ,  the 

266 


The  "Tremolino" 

next  in  age  and  wisdom  of  our  band,  he  had 
broken  loose  from  the  unyielding  rigidity  of 
his  family,  solidly  rooted,  if  I  remember 
rightly,  in  a  well-to-do  London  suburb. 
On  their  respectable  authority  he  intro- 
duced himself  meekly  to  strangers  as  a 
" black  sheep.' '  I  have  never  seen  a  more 
guileless  specimen  of  an  outcast.     Never. 

However,  his  people  had  the  grace  to  send 
him  a  little  money  now  and  then.  Enam- 
ored of  the  south,  of  Provence,  of  its  peo- 
ple, its  life,  its  sunshine  and  its  poetry,  nar- 
row-chested, tall,  and  short-sighted,  he  strode 
along  the  streets  and  the  lanes,  his  long  feet 
projecting  far  in  advance  of  his  body,  and 
his  white  nose  and  gingery  mustache  buried 
in  an  open  book:  for  he  had  the  habit  of 
reading  as  he  walked.  How  he  avoided  fall- 
ing into  precipices,  off  the  quays,  or  down 
staircases  is  a  great  mystery.  The  sides  of 
his  overcoat  bulged  out  with  pocket-editions 
of  various  poets.  When  not  engaged  in 
reading  Virgil,  Homer,  or  Mistral,  in  parks, 
restaurants,  streets,  and  suchlike  public 
places,  he  indited  sonnets  (in  French)  to  the 
eyes,  ears,  chin,  hair,  and  other  visible  per- 
18  267 


The   Mirror  of  the  Sea 

fections  of  a  nymph  called  Therese,  the 
daughter,  truth  compels  me  to  state,  of  a 
certain  Madame  Leonore  who  kept  a  small 
cafe*  for  sailors  in  one  of  the  narrowest 
streets  of  the  old  town. 

No  more  charming  face,  clear-cut  like  an 
antique  gem,  and  delicate  in  coloring  like 
the  petal  of  a  flower,  had  ever  been  set  on, 
alas!  a  somewhat  squat  body.  He  read  his 
verses  aloud  to  her  in  the  very  cafe*  with 
the  innocence  of  a  little  child  and  the  vanity 
of  a  poet.  We  followed  him  there  willingly 
enough,  if  only  to  watch  the  divine  TheYese 
laugh,  under  the  vigilant  black  eyes  of 
Madame  Leonore,  her  mother.  She  laughed 
very  prettily,  not  so  much  at  the  sonnets, 
which  she  could  not  but  esteem,  as  at  poor 
Henry's  French  accent,  which  was  unique, 
resembling  the  warbling  of  birds,  if  birds 
ever  warbled  with  a  stuttering,  nasal  in- 
tonation. 

Our  third  partner  was  Roger  P.   de  la 

S ,    the   most    Scandinavian-looking    of 

Provencal  squires,  fair,  and  six  feet  high,  as 
became  a  descendant  of  sea-roving  North- 
men, authoritative,  incisive,  wittily  scorn- 
2  63 


The  "Tremolino" 

ftd,  with  a  comedy  in  three  acts  in  his 
pocket,  and  in  his  breast  a  heart  blighted  by 
a  hopeless  passion  for  his  beautiful  cousin, 
married  to  a  wealthy  hide  and  tallow  mer- 
chant. He  used  to  take  us  to  lunch  at  their 
house  without  ceremony.  I  admired  the 
good  lady's  sweet  patience.  The  husband 
was  a  conciliatory  soul,  with  a  great  fund  of 
resignation,  which  he  expended  on  "Roger's 
friends."  I  suspect  he  was  secretly  horrified 
at  these  invasions.  But  it  was  a  Carlist 
salon,  and  as  such  we  were  made  welcome. 
The  possibility  of  raising  Catalonia  in  the 
interest  of  the  Rey  netto,  who  had  just  then 
crossed  the  Pyrenees,  was  much  discussed 
there. 

Don  Carlos,  no  doubt,  must  have  had 
many  queer  friends  (it  is  the  common  lot  of 
all  pretenders),  but  among  them  none  more 
extravagantly  fantastic  than  the  Tremolino 
Syndicate,  which  used  to  meet  in  a  tavern 
on  the  quays  of  the  old  port.  The  antique 
city  of  Massilia  had  surely  never,  since  the 
days  of  the  earliest  Phoenicians,  known  an 
odder  set  of  ship-owners.  We  met  to  dis- 
cuss and  settle  the  plan  of  operations  for 
269 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

each  voyage  of  the  Tremolino.  In  these 
operations  a  banking-house,  too,  was  con- 
cerned— a  very  respectable  banking-house. 
But  I  am  afraid  I  shall  end  by  saying  too 
much.  Ladies,  too,  were  concerned  (I  am 
really  afraid  I  am  saying  too  much) — all 
sorts  of  ladies,  some  old  enough  to  know 
better  than  to  put  their  trust  in  princes, 
others  young  and  full  of  illusions. 

One  of  these  last  was  extremely  amusing 
in  the  imitations  she  gave  us,  in  confidence, 
of  various  highly  placed  personages  she  was 
perpetually  rushing  off  to  Paris  to  interview 
in  the  interests  of  the  cause  —  Por  el  Rey! 
For  she  was  a  Carlist,  and  of  Basque  blood 
at  that,  with  something  of  a  lioness  in  the 
expression  of  her  courageous  face  (especially 
when  she  let  her  hair  down),  and  with  the 
volatile  little  soul  of  a  sparrow  dressed  in 
fine  Parisian  feathers,  which  had  the  trick 
of  coming  off  disconcertingly  at  unexpected 
moments. 

But  her  imitations  of  a  Parisian  person- 
age, very  highly  placed,  indeed,  as  she  rep- 
resented him  standing  in  the  corner  of  a 
room  with  his  face  to  the  wall,  rubbing  the 
270 


The  "Tremolino" 

back  of  his  head  and  moaning  helplessly, 
"Rita,  you  are  the  death  of  me,"  were 
enough  to  make  one  (if  young  and  free  from 
cares)  split  one's  sides  laughing.  She  had 
an  uncle  still  living,  a  very  effective  Carlist, 
too,  the  priest  of  a  little  mountain  parish  in 
Guipuzcoa.  As  the  sea  -  going  member  of 
the  syndicate  (whose  plans  depended  greatly 
on  Dona  Rita's  information),  I  used  to  be 
charged  with  humbly  affectionate  messages 
for  the  old  man.  These  messages  I  was  sup- 
posed to  deliver  to  the  Arragonese  muleteers 
(who  were  sure  to  await  at  certain  times  the 
Tremolino  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Gulf 
of  Rosas) ,  for  faithful  transportation  inland, 
together  with  the  various  unlawful  goods 
landed  secretly  from  under  the  Tremolino' 's 
hatches. 

Well,  now,  I  have  really  let  out  too  much 
(as  I  feared  I  should  in  the  end)  as  to  the 
usual  contents  of  my  sea-cradle.  But  let  it 
stand.  And  if  anybody  remarks  cynically 
that  I  must  have  been  a  promising  infant  in 
those  days,  let  that  stand,  too.  I  am  con- 
cerned but  for  the  good  name  of  the  Tremo- 
lino, and  I  affirm  that  a  ship  is  ever  guilt- 
371 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

less  of  the  sins,  transgressions,  and  follies  of 
her  men. 


It  was  not  Tremolino's  fault  that  the  syn- 
dicate depended  so  much  on  the  wit  and 
wisdom  and  the  information  of  Dona  Rita. 
She  had  taken  a  little  furnished  house  on 
the  Prado  for  the  good  of  the  cause — Por  el 
Rey!  She  was  always  taking  little  houses 
for  somebody's  good,  for  the  sick  or  the 
sorry,  for  broken-down  artists,  cleaned-out 
gamblers,  temporarily  unlucky  speculators 
— vieux  amis — old  friends,  as  she  used  to 
explain  apologetically,  with  a  shrug  of  her 
fine  shoulders. 

Whether  Don  Carlos  was  one  of  the  "old 
friends,"  too,  it's  hard  to  say.  More  un- 
likely things  have  been  heard  of  in  smoking- 
rooms.  All  I  know  is  that  one  evening,  en- 
tering incautiously  the  salon  of  the  little 
house  just  after  the  news  of  a  considerable 
Carlist  success  had  reached  the  faithful,  I 
was  seized  round  the  neck  and  waist  and 
whirled  recklessly  three  times  round  the 
272 


The  "Tremolino" 

room,  to  the  crash  of  upsetting  furniture 
and  the  humming  of  a  valse  tune  in  a  warm, 
contralto  voice. 

When  released  from  the  dizzy  embrace,  I 
sat  down  on  the  carpet — suddenly,  without 
affectation.  In  this  unpretentious  attitude 
I  became  aware  that  J.  M.  K.  B.  had  fol- 
lowed me  into  the  room,  elegant,  fatal,  cor- 
rect and  severe  in  a  white  tie  and  large  shirt- 
front.  In  answer  to  his  politely  sinister, 
prolonged  glance  of  inquiry,  I  overheard 
Dona  Rita  murmuring,  with  some  confusion 
and  annoyance,  "Vous  £tes  bete  mon  cher. 
Voy ons !  Ca  u 'a  aucune  consequence. ' '  Well 
content  in  this  case  to  be  of  no  particular 
consequence,  I  had  already  about  me  the  ele- 
ments of  some  worldly  sense. 

Rearranging  my  collar,  which,  truth  to 
say,  ought  to  have  been  a  round  one  above 
a  short  jacket,  but  was  not,  I  observed, 
felicitously,  that  I  had  come  to  say  good- 
bye, being  ready  to  go  off  to  sea  that  very 
night  with  the  Tremolino.  Our  hostess, 
slightly  panting  yet,  and  just  a  shade  di- 
shevelled, turned  tartly  upon  J.  M.  K.  B., 
desiring  to  know  when  he  would  be  ready  to 
273 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

go  off  by  the  Tremolino,  or  in  any  other  way, 
in  order  to  join  the  royal  headquarters. 
Did  he  intend,  she  asked,  ironically,  to  wait 
for  the  very  eve  of  the  entry  into  Madrid? 
Thus  by  a  judicious  exercise  of  tact  and  as- 
perity we  re-established  the  atmospheric 
equilibrium  of  the  room  long  before  I  left  a 
little  before  midnight,  now  tenderly  recon- 
ciled, to  walk  down  to  the  harbor  and  hail 
the  Tremolino  by  the  usual  soft  whistle  from 
the  edge  of  the  quay.  It  was  our  signal, 
invariably  heard  by  the  ever-watchful  Dom- 
inic, the  padrone. 

He  would  raise  a  lantern  silently  to  light 
my  steps  along  the  narrow,  springy  plank  of 
our  primitive  gangway.  "And  so  we  are 
going  off,"  he  would  murmur  directly  my 
foot  touched  the  deck.  I  was  the  harbinger 
of  sudden  departures,  but  there  was  nothing 
in  the  world  sudden  enough  to  take  Dominic 
unawares.  His  thick  black  mustaches,  curl- 
ed every  morning  with  hot  tongs  by  the 
barber  at  the  corner  of  the  quay,  seemed  to 
hide  a  perpetual  smile.  But  nobody,  I  be- 
lieve, had  ever  seen  the  true  shape  of  his 
lips.  From  the  slow,  imperturbable  gravity 
274 


The  "Tremolino" 

of  that  broad-chested  man  you  would  think 
he  had  never  smiled  in  his  life.  In  his  eyes 
lurked  a  look  of  perfectly  remorseless  irony, 
as  though  he  had  been  provided  with  an  ex- 
tremely experienced  soul;  and  the  slightest 
distension  of  his  nostrils  would  give  to  his 
bronzed  face  a  look  of  extraordinary  bold- 
ness. This  was  the  only  play  of  feature  of 
which  he  seemed  capable,  being  a  southern- 
er of  a  concentrated,  deliberate  type.  His 
ebony  hair  curled  slightly  on  the  temples. 
He  may  have  been  forty  years  old,  and  he 
was  a  great  voyager  on  the  inland  sea. 

Astute  and  ruthless,  he  could  have  rivalled 
in  resource  the  unfortunate  son  of  Laertes 
and  Anticlea.  If  he  did  not  pit  his  craft 
and  audacity  against  the  very  gods,  it  is 
only  because  the  Olympian  gods  are  dead. 
Certainly  no  woman  could  frighten  him.  A 
one-eyed  giant  would  have  had  not  the 
ghost  of  a  chance  against  Dominic  Cervoni, 
of  Corsica,  not  Ithaca;  and  no  king,  son  of 
kings,  but  of  very  respectable  family — au- 
thentic Caporali,  he  affirmed.  But  that  is 
as  it  may  be.  The  Caporali  families  date 
back  to  the  twelfth  century. 
275 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

For  want  of  more  exalted  adversaries, 
Dominic  turned  his  audacity,  fertile  in  im- 
pious stratagems,  against  the  powers  of  the 
earth,  as  represented  by  the  institution  of 
custom-houses  and  every  mortal  belonging 
thereto  —  scribes,  officers,  and  guardacostas 
afloat  and  ashore.  He  was  the  very  man 
for  us,  this  modern  and  unlawful  wanderer 
with  his  own  legend  of  loves,  dangers,  and 
bloodshed.  He  told  us  bits  of  it  sometimes 
in  measured,  ironic  tones.  He  spoke  Cata- 
lonian,  the  Italian  of  Corsica,  and  the  French 
of  Provence  with  the  same  easy  naturalness. 
Dressed  in  shore  togs,  a  white  starched  shirt, 
black  jacket,  and  round  hat,  as  I  took  him 
once  to  see  Dona  Rita,  he  was  extremely 
presentable.  He  could  make  himself  in- 
teresting by  a  tactful  and  rugged  reserve  set 
off  by  a  grim,  almost  imperceptible,  playful- 
ness of  tone  and  manner. 

He  had  the  physical  assurance  of  strong- 
hearted  men.  After  half  an  hour's  inter- 
view in  the  dining-room,  during  which  they 
got  in  touch  with  each  other  in  an  amazing 
way,  Rita  told  us  in  her  best  grande  -  dame 
manner:  "Mais  il  est  parfait,  cet  homme." 
276 


The  "Tremolino" 

He  was  perfect.  On  board  the  Tremolino, 
wrapped  up  in  a  black  caban,  the  picturesque 
cloak  of  Mediterranean  seamen,  with  those 
massive  mustaches  and  his  remorseless  eyes 
set  off  by  the  shadow  of  the  deep  hood,  he 
looked  piratical  and  monkish  and  darkly 
initiated  into  the  most  awful  mysteries  of 
the  sea. 


Anyway,  he  was  perfect,  as  Dona  Rita 
had  declared.  The  only  thing  unsatisfac- 
tory (and  even  inexplicable)  about  our 
Dominic  was  his  nephew  Cesar.  It  was 
startling  to  see  a  desolate  expression  of 
shame  veil  the  remorseless  audacity  in  the 
eyes  of  that  man  superior  to  all  scruples  and 
terrors. 

"I  would  never  have  dared  to  bring  him 
on  board  your  balancelle,"  he  once  apolo- 
gized to  me.  "But  what  am  I  to  do?  His 
mother  is  dead,  and  my  brother  has  gone 
into  the  bush." 

In  this  way  I  learned  that  our  Dominic 
had  a  brother.  As  to  "going  into  the 
277 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

bush,"  this  only  means  that  a  man  has  done 
his  duty  successfully  in  the  pursuit  of  a 
hereditary  vendetta.  The  feud  which  had 
existed  for  ages  between  the  families  of 
Cervoni  and  Brunaschi  was  so  old  that  it 
seemed  to  have  smouldered  out  at  last. 
One  evening  Pietro  Brunaschi,  after  a 
laborious  day  among  his  olive-trees,  sat  on 
a  chair  against  the  wall  of  his  house  with  a 
bowl  of  broth  on  his  knees  and  a  piece  of 
bread  in  his  hand.  Dominic's  brother,  go- 
ing home  with  a  gun  on  his  shoulder,  found 
a  sudden  offence  in  this  sight  of  content  and 
rest  so  obviously  calculated  to  awaken  the 
feelings  of  hatred  and  revenge.  He  and 
Pietro  had  never  had  any  personal  quarrel; 
but,  as  Dominic  explained,  "all  our  dead 
cried  out  to  him."  He  shouted  from  be- 
hind a  wall  of  stones,  "Oh,  Pietro!  Behold 
what  is  coming!"  And  as  the  other  looked 
up  innocently  he  took  aim  at  the  forehead 
and  squared  the  old  vendetta  account  so 
neatly  that,  according  to  Dominic,  the  dead 
man  continued  to  sit  with  the  bowl  of  broth 
on  his  knees  and  the  piece  of  bread  in  his 
hand. 

?78 


The  "Tremolino,, 

This  is  why  —  because  in  Corsica  your 
dead  will  not  leave  you  alone — Dominic's 
brother  had  to  go  into  the  maquis,  into  the 
bush  on  the  wild  mountain- side,  to  dodge 
the  gendarmes  for  the  insignificant  remain- 
der of  his  life,  and  Dominic  had  charge  of 
his  nephew  with  a  mission  to  make  a  man 
of  him. 

No  more  unpromising  undertaking  could 
be  imagined.  The  very  material  for  the 
task  seemed  wanting.  The  Cervonis,  if  not 
handsome  men,  were  good  sturdy  flesh  and 
blood.  But  this  extraordinarily  lean  and 
livid  youth  seemed  to  have  no  more  blood 
in  him  than  a  snail. 

"vSome  cursed  witch  must  have  stolen  my 
brother's  child  from  the  cradle  and  put  that 
spawn  of  a  starved  devil  in  its  place," 
Dominic  would  say  to  me.  "Look  at  him! 
Just  look  at  him!,, 

To  look  at  Cesar  was  not  pleasant.  His 
parchment  skin,  showing  dead  white  on  his 
cranium  through  the  thin  wisps  of  dirty 
brown  hair,  seemed  to  be  glued  directly  and 
tightly  upon  his  big  bones.  Without  being 
in  any  way  deformed,  he  was  the  nearest  ap- 
279 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

proach  which  I  have  ever  seen  or  could  im- 
agine to  what  is  commonly  understood  by 
the  word  " monster.' '  That  the  source  of 
the  effect  produced  was  really  moral  I  have 
no  doubt.  An  utterly,  hopelessly  depraved 
nature  was  expressed  in  physical  terms,  that 
taken  each  separately  had  nothing  posi- 
tively startling.  You  imagined  him  clam- 
mily cold  to  the  touch,  like  a  snake.  The 
slightest  reproof,  the  most  mild  and  justifi- 
able remonstrance,  would  be  met  by  a  re- 
sentful glare  and  an  evil  shrinking  of  his 
thin,  dry  upper  lip,  a  snarl  of  hate  to  which 
he  generally  added  the  agreeable  sound  of 
grinding  teeth. 

It  was  for  this  venomous  performance 
rather  than  for  his  lies,  impudence,  and 
laziness  that  his  uncle  used  to  knock  him 
down.  It  must  not  be  imagined  that  it  was 
anything  in  the  nature  of  a  brutal  assault. 
Dominic's  brawny  arm  would  be  seen  de- 
scribing deliberately  an  ample  horizontal 
gesture,  a  dignified  sweep,  and  Cesar  would 
go  over  suddenly  like  a  ninepin — which  was 
funny  to  see.  But,  once  down,  he  would 
writhe  on  the  deck,  gnashing  his  teeth  in 
280 


The  "Tremolino" 

impotent  rage — which  was  pretty  horrible 
to  behold.  And  it  also  happened  more  than 
once  that  he  would  disappear  completely — 
which  was  startling  to  observe.  This  is  the 
exact  truth.  Before  some  of  these  majestic 
cuffs  Cesar  would  go  down  and  vanish.  He 
would  vanish  heels  overhead  into  open  hatch- 
ways, into  scuttles,  behind  up-ended  casks,  ac- 
cording to  the  place  where  he  happened  to 
come  into  contact  with  his  uncle's  mighty  arm. 

Once  —  it  was  in  the  old  harbor,  just 
before  the  Tremolino' s  last  voyage — he  van- 
ished thus  overboard  to  my  infinite  con- 
sternation. Dominic  and  I  had  been  talk- 
ing business  together  aft,  and  Cesar  had 
sneaked  up  behind  us  to  listen,  for,  among 
his  other  perfections,  he  was  a  consummate 
eavesdropper  and  spy.  At  the  sound  of  the 
heavy  plop  alongside  horror  held  me  rooted 
to  the  spot ;  but  Dominic  stepped  quietly  to 
the  rail  and  leaned  over,  waiting  for  his 
nephew's  miserable  head  to  bob  up  for  the 
first  time. 

"Ohe,  Cesar!"  he  yelled,  contemptuously, 
to  the  spluttering  wretch.     "Catch  hold  of 
that  mooring  hawser — charogne!" 
281 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

He  approached  me  to  resume  the  inter- 
rupted conversation. 

"What  about  Cesar?"  I  asked,  anxiously. 

"Canallia!  Let  him  hang  there,"  was  his 
answer.  And  he  went  on  talking  over  the 
business  in  hand  calmly,  while  I  tried  vainly 
to  dismiss  from  my  mind  the  picture  of 
Cesar  steeped  to  the  chin  in  the  water  of 
the  old  harbor,  a  decoction  of  centuries  of 
marine  refuse.  I  tried  to  dismiss  it,  be- 
cause the  mere  notion  of  that  liquid  made 
me  feel  very  sick.  Presently  Dominic,  hail- 
ing an  idle  boatman,  directed  him  to  go  and 
fish  his  nephew  out;  and  by-and-by  Cesar 
appeared  walking  on  board  from  the  quay, 
shivering,  streaming  with  filthy  water,  with 
bits  of  rotten  straws  in  his  hair  and  a  piece 
of  dirty  orange-peel  stranded  on  his  shoul- 
der. His  teeth  chattered;  his  yellow  eyes 
squinted  balefully  at  us  as  he  passed  for- 
ward. I  thought  it  my  duty  to  remon- 
strate. 

"Why    are    you    always    knocking    him 
about,  Dominic?"  I  asked.     Indeed,  I  felt 
convinced  it  was  no  earthly  good — a  sheer 
waste  of  muscular  force. 
282 


The  "Tremolino" 

"I  must  try  to  make  a  man  of  him," 
Dominic  answered,  hopelessly. 

I  restrained  the  obvious  retort  that  in 
this  way  he  ran  the  risk  of  making,  in  the 
words  of  the  immortal  Mr.  Mantalini,  "a 
demnition  damp,  unpleasant  corpse  of  him." 

"He  wants  to  be  a  locksmith!"  burst  out 
Cervoni.  "To  learn  how  to  pick  locks,  I 
suppose,"  he  added,  with  sardonic  bitter- 
ness. 

"Why  not  let  him  be  a  locksmith?"  I 
ventured. 

"Who  would  teach  him?"  he  cried. 
"Where  could  I  leave  him?"  he  asked,  with 
a  drop  in  his  voice;  and  I  had  my  first 
glimpse  of  genuine  despair.  "He  steals, 
you  know,  alas!  Par  la  Madonne!  I  be- 
lieve he  would  put  poison  in  your  food  and 
mine — the  viper!" 

He  raised  his  face  and  both  his  clinched 
fists  slowly  to  heaven.  However,  Cesar 
never  dropped  poison  into  our  cups.  One 
cannot  be  sure,  but  I  fancy  he  went  to  work 
in  another  way. 

This  voyage,  of  which  the  details  need 
not  be  given,  we  had  to  range  far  afield  for 
19  283 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

sufficient  reasons.  Coming  up  from  the 
south  to  end  it  with  the  important  and 
really  dangerous  part  of  the  scheme  in  hand, 
we  found  it  necessary  to  look  into  Barcelona 
for  certain  definite  information.  This  ap- 
pears like  running  one's  head  into  the  very 
jaws  of  the  lion,  but  in  reality  it  was  not  so. 
We  had  one  or  two  high,  influential  friends 
there,  and  many  others  humble  but  valu- 
able because  bought  for  good  hard  cash. 
We  were  in  no  danger  of  being  molested ;  in- 
deed, the  important  information  reached  us 
promptly  by  the  hands  of  a  custom-house 
officer,  who  came  on  board  full  of  showy 
zeal  to  poke  an  iron  rod  into  the  layer  of 
oranges  which  made  the  visible  part  of  our 
cargo  in  the  hatchway.  I  forgot  to  men- 
tion before  that  the  Tremolino  was  official- 
ly known  as  a  fruit  and  cork-wood  trader. 
The  zealous  officer  managed  to  slip  a  useful 
piece  of  paper  into  Dominic's  hand  as  he 
went  ashore,  and  a  few  hours  afterwards, 
being  off  duty,  he  returned  on  board  again 
athirst  for  drinks  and  gratitude.  He  got 
both  as  a  matter  of  course.  While  he  sat 
sipping  his  liqueur  in  the  tiny  cabin,  Dom- 
284 


The  "Tremolino" 

inic  plied  him  with  questions  as  to  the 
whereabouts  of  the  guardacostas .  The  pre- 
ventive service  afloat  was  really  the  one  for 
us  to  reckon  with,  and  it  was  material  for 
our  success  and  safety  to  know  the  exact 
position  of  the  patrol-craft  in  the  neighbor- 
hood. The  news  could  not  have  been  more 
favorable.  The  officer  mentioned  a  small 
place  on  the  coast  some  twelve  miles  off, 
where,  unsuspicious  and  unready,  she  was 
lying  at  anchor,  with  her  sails  unbent,  paint- 
ing yards  and  scraping  spars.  Then  he  left 
us  after  the  usual  compliments,  smirking 
reassuringly  over  his  shoulder. 

I  had  kept  below  pretty  close  all  day 
from  excess  of  prudence.  The  stake  played 
on  that  trip  was  big. 

"We  are  ready  to  go  at  once,  but  for 
Cesar,  who  has  been  missing  ever  since 
breakfast,"  announced  Dominic  to  me  in 
his  slow,  grim  way. 

Where  the  fellow  had  gone,  and  why,  we 
could  not  imagine.  The  usual  surmises  in 
the  case  of  a  missing  seaman  did  not  apply 
to  Cesar's  absence.  He  was  too  odious  for 
love,  friendship,  gambling,  or  even  casual 
285 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

intercourse.  But  once  or  twice  he  had 
wandered  away  like  this  before. 

Dominic  went  ashore  to  look  for  him,  but 
returned  at  the  end  of  two  hours  alone  and 
very  angry,  as  I  could  see  by  the  token  of 
the  invisible  smile  under  his  mustache  be- 
ing intensified.  We  wondered  what  had  be- 
come of  the  wretch,  and  made  a  hurried  in- 
vestigation among  our  portable  property. 
He  had  stolen  nothing. 

"He  will  be  back  before  long,"  I  said, 
confidently. 

Ten  minutes  afterwards  one  of  the  men 
on  deck  called  out,  loudly : 

"I  can  see  him  coming.' ' 

Cesar  had  only  his  shirt  and  trousers  on. 
He  had  sold  his  coat,  apparently,  for  pocket- 
money. 

"You  knave!"  was  all  Dominic  said,  with 
a  terrible  softness  of  voice.  He  restrained 
his  choler  for  a  time.  "Where  have  you 
been,  vagabond?"  he  asked,  menacingly. 

Nothing  would  induce  Cesar  to  answer 
that  question.  It  was  as  if  he  even  dis- 
dained to  lie.  He  faced  us,  drawing  back 
his  lips  and  gnashing  his  teeth,  and  did  not 
286 


The  "Tremolino" 

shrink  an  inch  before  the  sweep  of  Dominic's 
arm.  He  went  down  as  if  shot,  of  course. 
But  this  time  I  noticed  that,  when  picking 
himself  up,  he  remained  longer  than  usual 
on  all  fours,  baring  his  big  teeth  over  his 
shoulder  and  glaring  upward  at  his  uncle 
with  a  new  sort  of  hate  in  his  round,  yellow 
eyes.  That  permanent  sentiment  seemed 
pointed  at  that  moment  by  especial  malice 
and  curiosity.  I  was  quite  interested.  If 
he  ever  manages  to  put  poison  in  the  dishes, 
I  thought  to  myself,  this  is  how  he  will  look 
at  us  as  we  sit  at  our  meal.  But  I  did  not, 
of  course,  believe  for  a  moment  that  he 
would  ever  put  poison  in  our  food.  He  ate 
the  same  things  himself.  Moreover,  he  had 
no  poison.  And  I  could  not  imagine  a 
human  being  so  blinded  by  cupidity  as  to 
sell  poison  to  such  an  atrocious  creature. 


We  slipped  out  to  sea  quietly  at  dusk, 

and  all  through  the  night  everything  went 

well.     The  breeze  was  gusty;  a  southerly 

blow  was  making  up.     It  was  fair  wind  for 

287 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

our  course.  Now  and  then  Dominic  slowly 
and  rhythmically  struck  his  hands  togeth- 
er a  few  times,  as  if  applauding  the  per- 
formance of  the  Tremolino.  The  balancelle 
hummed  and  quivered  as  she  flew  along, 
dancing  lightly  under  our  feet. 

At  daybreak  I  pointed  out  to  Dominic, 
among  the  several  sail  in  view  running  be- 
fore the  gathering  storm,  one  particular  ves- 
sel. The  press  of  canvas  she  carried  made 
her  loom  up  high,  end-on,  like  a  gray  column 
standing  motionless  directly  in  our  wake. 

"Look  at  this  fellow,  Dominic,"  I  said. 
"He  seems  to  be  in  a  hurry." 
.  The  padrone  made  no  remark,  but,  wrap- 
ping his  black  cloak  close  about  him,  stood 
up  to  look.  His  weather-tanned  face,  framed 
in  the  hood,  had  an  aspect  of  authority  and 
challenging  force,  with  the  deep-set  eyes  gaz- 
ing far  away  fixedly,  without  a  wink,  like 
the  intent,  merciless,  steady  eyes  of  a  sea- 
bird. 

"Chi  va  piano  va  sano,"  he  remarked  at 
last,  with  a  derisive  glance  over  the  side, 
in  ironic  allusion  to  our  own  tremendous 
speed. 

288 


The  "Tremolino" 

The  Tremolino  was  doing  her  best,  and 
seemed  to  hardly  touch  the  great  burst  of 
foam  over  which  she  darted.  I  crouched 
down  again  to  get  some  shelter  from  the 
low  bulwark.  After  more  than  half  an  hour 
of  swaying  immobility  expressing  a  concen- 
trated, breathless  watchfulness,  Dominic 
sank  on  the  deck  by  my  side.  Within  the 
monkish  cowl  his  eyes  gleamed  with  a  fierce 
expression  which  surprised  me.  All  he  said 
was: 

"He  has  come  out  here  to  wash  the  new 
paint  off  his  yards,  I  suppose." 

"What?"  I  shouted,  getting  up  on  my 
knees.     "  Is  she  a  guardacosta  ?" 

The  perpetual  suggestion  of  a  smile  under 
Dominic's  piratical  mustache  seemed  to  be- 
come more  accentuated  —  quite  real,  grim, 
actually  almost  visible  through  the  wet  and 
uncurled  hair.  Judging  by  that  symptom, 
he  must  have  been  in  a  towering  rage.  But 
I  could  also  see  that  he  was  puzzled,  and 
that  discovery  affected  me  disagreeably. 
Dominic  puzzled!  For  a  long  time,  leaning 
against  the  bulwark,  I  gazed  over  the  stern 
at  the  gray  column  that  seemed  to  stand 
289 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

swaying  slightly  in  our  wake  always  at  the 
same  distance. 

Meanwhile,  Dominic,  black  and  cowled, 
sat  cross-legged  on  the  deck,  with  his  back 
to  the  wind,  recalling  vaguely  an  Arab  chief 
in  his  burnuss  sitting  on  the  sand.  Above 
his  motionless  figure  the  little  cord  and 
tassel  on  the  stiff  point  of  the  hood  swung 
about  inanely  in  the  gale.  At  last  I  gave  up 
facing  the  wind  and  rain,  and  crouched 
down  by  his  side.  I  was  satisfied  that  the 
sail  was  a  patrol -craft.  Her  presence  was 
not  a  thing  to  talk  about,  but  soon,  between 
two  clouds  charged  with  hail  -  showers,  a 
burst  of  sunshine  fell  upon  her  sails,  and 
our  men  discovered  her  character  for  them- 
selves. From  that  moment  I  noticed  that 
they  seemed  to  take  no  heed  of  one  another 
or  of  anything  else.  They  could  spare  no 
eyes  and  no  thought  but  for  the  slight 
column  -  shape  astern  of  us.  Its  swaying 
had  become  perceptible.  For  a  moment  she 
remained  dazzlingly  white,  then  faded  away 
slowly  to  nothing  in  a  squall,  only  to  re- 
appear again,  nearly  black,  resembling  a 
post  stuck  upright  against  the  slaty  back- 

2QO 


The  "Tremolino" 

ground  of  solid  cloud.     Since  first  noticed 
she  had  not  gained  on  us  a  foot. 

"She  will  never  catch  the  Tremolino,1'  I 
said,  exultingly. 

Dominic  did  not  look  at  me.  He  re- 
marked, absently,  but  justly,  that  the  heavy 
weather  was  in  our  pursuer's  favor.  She 
was  three  times  our  size.  What  we  had  to 
do  was  to  keep  our  distance  till  dark,  which 
we  could  manage  easily,  and  then  haul  off  to 
seaward  and  consider  the  situation.  But 
his  thoughts  seemed  to  stumble  in  the  dark- 
ness of  some  not-solved  enigma,  and  soon  he 
fell  silent.  We  ran  steadily,  wing-and-wing. 
Cape  San  Sebastian  nearly  ahead  seemed  to 
recede  from  us  in  the  squalls  of  rain,  and 
come  out  again  to  meet  our  rush,  every  time 
more  distinct  between  the  showers. 

For  my  part  I  was  by  no  means  certain 
that  this  gabelou  (as  our  men  alluded  to  her 
opprobriously)  was  after  us  at  all.  There 
were  nautical  difficulties  in  such  a  view 
which  made  me  express  the  sanguine  opinion 
that  she  was  in  all  innocence  simply  chang- 
ing her  station.  At  this  Dominic  conde- 
scended to  turn  his  head. 
291 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

"I  tell  you  she  is  in  chase,"  he  affirmed, 
moodily,  after  one  short  glance  astern. 

I  never  doubted  his  opinion.  But  with 
all  the  ardor  of  a  neophyte  and  the  pride  of 
an  apt  learner  I  was  at  that  time  a  great 
nautical  casuist. 

"What  I  can't  understand,"  I  insisted, 
subtly,  "is  how  on  earth,  with  this  wind, 
she  has  managed  to  be  just  where  she  was 
when  we  first  made  her  out.  \t  is  clear 
that  she  could  not,  and  did  not,  gain  twelve 
miles  on  us  during  the  night.  And  there 
are  other  impossibilities.  ..." 

Dominic  had  been  sitting  motionless,  like 
an  inanimate  black  cone  posed  on  the  stern- 
deck,  near  the  rudder-head,  with  a  small 
tassel  fluttering  on  its  sharp  point,  and  for  a 
time  he  preserved  the  immobility  of  his 
meditation.  Then,  bending  over  with  a 
short  laugh,  he  gave  my  ear  the  bitter  fruit 
of  it.  He  understood  everything  now  per- 
fectly. She  was  where  we  had  seen  her  first, 
not  because  she  had  caught  us  up,  but  be- 
cause we  had  passed  her  during  the  night 
while  she  was  already  waiting  for  us,  ho  ve- 
to, most  likely,  on  our  very  track. 
292 


The  "Tremolino" 

"Do  you  understand — already?"  Dominic 
muttered,  in  a  fierce  undertone.  "  Already! 
You  know  we  left  a  good  eight  hours  before 
we  were  expected  to  leave,  otherwise  she 
would  have  been  in  time  to  lie  in  wait  for 
us  on  the  other  side  of  the  Cape,  and" — he 
snapped  his  teeth  like  a  wolf  close  to  my 
face — "and  she  would  have  had  us  like — 
that." 

I  saw  it  all  plainly  enough  now.  They 
had  eyes  in  their  heads  and  all  their  wits 
about  them  in  that  craft.  We  had  passed 
them  in  the  dark  as  they  jogged  on  easily 
towards  their  ambush  with  the  idea  that  we 
were  yet  far  behind.  At  daylight,  how- 
ever, sighting  a  balancelle  ahead  under  a 
press  of  canvas,  they  had  made  sail  in  chase. 
But  if  that  was  so,  then — 

Dominic  seized  my  arm. 

"Yes,  yes!  She  came  out  on  an  infor- 
mation —  do  you  see  it  ?  —  on  information. 
.  .  .  We  have  been  sold — betrayed.  Why? 
How?  What  for?  We  always  paid  them 
all  so  well  on  shore.  ...  No!  But  it  is  my 
head  that  is  going  to  burst." 

He  seemed  to  choke,  tugged  at  the  throat 
293 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

button  of  the  cloak,  jumped  up  open- 
mouthed  as  if  to  hurl  curses  and  denuncia- 
tion, but  instantly  mastered  himself,  and, 
wrapping  up  the  cloak  closer  about  him,  sat 
down  on  the  deck  again  as  quiet  as  ever. 

"Yes,  it  must  be  the  work  of  some  scoun- 
drel ashore,"  I  observed. 

He  pulled  the  edge  of  the  hood  well  for- 
ward over  his  brow  before  he  muttered: 

"A  scoundrel.  .  .  .  Yes.  ...  It's  evident." 

"Well,"  I  said,  "they  can't  get  us,  that's 
clear." 

"No,"  he  assented,  quietly,  "they  can- 
not." 

We  shaved  the  Cape  very  close  to  avoid 
an  adverse  current.  On  the  other  side,  by 
the  effect  of  the  land,  the  wind  failed  us  so 
completely  for  a  moment  that  the  Trerno- 
lino's  two  great  lofty  sails  hung  idle  to  the 
masts  in  the  thundering  uproar  of  the  seas 
breaking  upon  the  shore  we  had  left  behind. 
And  when  the  returning  gust  filled  them 
again,  we  saw  with  amazement  half  of  the 
new  main-sail,  which  we  thought  fit  to  drive 
the  boat  under  before  giving  way,  abso- 
lutely fly  out  of  the  bolt-ropes.  We  lowered 
294 


The  "Tremolino' 

the  yard  at  once,  and  saved  it  all,  but  it 
was  no  longer  a  sail ;  it  was  only  a  heap  of 
soaked  strips  of  canvas  cumbering  the  deck 
and  weighting  the  craft.  Dominic  gave  the 
order  to  throw  the  whole  lot  overboard. 

"  I  would  have  had  the  yard  thrown  over- 
board, too,"  he  said,  leading  me  aft  again, 
"if  it  had  not  been  for  the  trouble.  Let  no 
sign  escape  you,"  he  continued,  lowering  his 
voice,  "but  I  am  going  to  tell  you  some- 
thing terrible.  Listen:  I  have  observed 
that  the  roping  stitches  on  that  sail  have 
been  cut!  You  hear?  Cut  with  a  knife  in 
many  places.  And  yet  it  stood  all  that 
time.  Not  enough  cut.  That  flap  did  it  at 
last.  What  matters  it?  But  look!  there's 
treachery  seated  on  this  very  deck.  By 
the  horns  of  the  devil!  seated  here  at  our 
very  backs.     Do  not  turn,  signorino." 

We  were  facing  aft  then. 

"What's  to  be  done?"  I  asked,  appalled. 

"Nothing.  Silence!  Be  a  man,  signo- 
rino." 

"What  else?"  I  said. 

To  show  I  could  be  a  man,  I  resolved  to 
utter  no  sound  as  long  as  Dominic  himself 
295 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

had  the  force  to  keep  his  lips  closed.  Noth- 
ing but  silence  becomes  certain  situations. 
Moreover,  the  experience  of  treachery  seem- 
ed to  spread  a  hopeless  drowsiness  over  my 
thoughts  and  senses.  For  an  hour  or  more 
we  watched  our  pursuer  surging  out  near- 
er and  nearer  from  among  the  squalls  that 
sometimes  hid  her  altogether.  But  even 
when  not  seen,  we  felt  her  there  like  a  knife 
at  our  throats.  She  gained  on  us  fright- 
fully. And  the  Tremolino,  in  a  fierce  breeze 
and  in  much  smoother  water,  swung  on 
easily  under  her  one  sail,  with  something 
appallingly  careless  in  the  joyous  freedom 
of  her  motion.  Another  half-hour  went  by. 
I  could  not  stand  it  any  longer. 

"They  will  get  the  poor  barky,"  I  stam- 
mered out  suddenly,  almost  on  the  verge  of 
tears. 

Dominic  stirred  no  more  than  a  carving. 
A  sense  of  catastrophic  loneliness  overcame 
my  inexperienced  soul.  The  vision  of  my 
companions  passed  before  me.  The  whole 
Royalist  gang  was  in  Monte  Carlo  now,  I 
reckoned.  And  they  appeared  to  me  clear- 
cut  and  very  small,  with  affected  voices  and 
206 


The  "Tremolino" 

stiff  gestures,  like  a  procession  of  rigid  mari- 
onettes upon  a  toy  stage.  I  gave  a  start. 
What  was  this?  A  mysterious,  remorseless 
whisper  came  from  within  the  motionless 
black  hood  at  my  side. 

"Ilfautlatuer." 

I  heard  it  very  well. 

"What  do  you  say,  Dominic ?"  I  asked, 
moving  nothing  but  my  lips. 

And  the  whisper  within  the  hood  repeated 
mysteriously,  "She  must  be  killed." 

My  heart  began  to  beat  violently. 

"That's  it,"  I  faltered  out.     "  But  how l" 

"You  love  her  well?" 

"I  do." 

"Then  you  must  find  the  heart  for  that 
work,  too.  You  must  steer  her  yourself, 
and  I  shall  see  to  it  that  she  dies  quickly, 
without  leaving  as  much  as  a  chip  be- 
hind." 

"Can  you?"  I  murmured,  fascinated  by 
the  black  hood  turned  immovably  over  the 
stern,  as  if  in  unlawful  communion  with 
that  old  sea  of  magicians,  slave  -  dealers, 
exiles,  and  warriors,  the  sea  of  legends  and 
terrors,  where  the  mariners  of  remote  an- 
297 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

tiquity  used  to  hear  the  restless  shade 
of  an  old  wanderer  weep  aloud  in  the 
dark. 

"I  know  a  rock,"  whispered  the  initiated 
voice  within  the  hood  secretly.  "But — 
caution!  It  must  be  done  before  they  per- 
ceive what  we  are  about.  Whom  can  we 
trust  now?  A  knife  drawn  across  the  fore- 
halyards  would  bring  the  foresail  down,  and 
put  an  end  to  our  liberty  in  twenty  minutes. 
And  the  best  of  our  men  may  be  afraid  of 
drowning.  There  is  our  little  boat,  but  in 
an  affair  like  this  no  one  can  be  sure  of  being 
saved." 

The  voice  ceased.  We  had  started  from 
Barcelona  with  our  dinghy  in  tow;  after- 
wards it  was  too  risky  to  try  to  get  her  in, 
so  we  let  her  take  her  chance  of  the  seas  at 
the  end  of  a  comfortable  scope  of  rope. 
Many  times  she  had  seemed  to  us  com- 
pletely overwhelmed,  but  soon  we  would  see 
her  bob  up  again  on  a  wave,  apparently  as 
buoyant  and  whole  as  ever. 

"I  understand,"  I  said,  softly.  "Very 
well,  Dominic.     When?" 

"Not  yet.  We  must  get  a  little  more  in 
298 


The  "Tremolino" 

first,"  answered  the  voice  from  the  hood  in 
a  ghostly  murmur. 


It  was  settled.  I  had  now  the  courage  to 
turn  about.  Our  men  crouched  about  the 
decks  here  and  there  with  anxious,  crest- 
fallen faces,  all  turned  one  way  to  watch 
the  chaser.  For  the  first  time  that  morn- 
ing I  perceived  Cesar  stretched  out  full 
length  on  the  deck  near  the  foremast,  and 
wondered  where  he  had  been  skulking  till 
then.  But  he  might  in  truth  have  been  at 
my  elbow  all  the  time  for  all  I  knew.  We 
had  been  too  absorbed  in  watching  our  fate 
to  pay  attention  to  one  another.  Nobody 
had  eaten  anything  that  morning,  but  the 
men  had  been  coming  constantly  to  drink 
at  the  water-butt. 

I  ran  down  to  the  cabin.  I  had  there, 
put  away  in  a  locker,  ten  thousand  francs  in 
gold,  of  whose  presence  on  board,  so  far  as  I 
was  aware,  not  a  soul  except  Dominic  had 
the  slightest  inkling.  When  I  emerged  on 
deck  again  Dominic  had  turned  about  and 
•e  299 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

was  peering  from  under  his  cowl  at  the 
coast.  Cape  Creux  closed  the  view  ahead. 
To  the  left  a  wide  bay,  its  waters  torn  and 
swept  by  fierce  squalls,  seemed  full  of  smoke. 
Astern  the  sky  had  a  menacing  look. 

Directly  he  saw  me,  Dominic,  in  a  placid 
tone,  wanted  to  know  what  was  the  matter. 
I  came  close  to  him  and,  looking  as  uncon- 
cerned as  I  could,  told  him  in  an  undertone 
that  I  had  found  the  locker  broken  open 
and  the  money-belt  gone.  Last  evening  it 
was  still  there. 

"What  did  you  want  to  do  with  it?"  he 
asked  me,  trembling  violently. 

"Put  it  round  my  waist,  of  course,' '  I  an- 
swered, amazed  to  hear  his  teeth  chattering. 

"Cursed  gold!"  he  muttered.  "The 
weight  of  the  money  might  have  cost  you 
your  life,  perhaps. "  He  shuddered.  "There 
is  no  time  to  talk  about  that  now." 

"I  am  ready." 

"Not  yet.  I  am  waiting  for  that  squall 
to  come  over,"  he  muttered.  And  a  few 
leaden  minutes  passed. 

The  squall  came  over  at  last.  Our  pur- 
suer, overtaken  by  a  sort  of  murky  whirl- 
300 


The  "Tremolino" 

wind,  disappeared  from  our  sight.  The 
Tremolino  quivered  and  bounded  forward. 
The  land  ahead  vanished,  too,  and  we 
seemed  to  be  left  alone  in  a  world  of  water 
and  wind. 

"Prenez  la  barre,  monsieur,"  Dominic 
broke  the  silence  suddenly  in  an  austere 
voice.  "Take  hold  of  the  tiller."  He  bent 
his  hood  to  my  ear.  "The  balancelle  is 
yours.  Your  own  hands  must  deal  the 
blow.  I — I  have  yet  another  piece  of  work 
to  do."  He  spoke  up  loudly  to  the  man 
who  steered.  "Let  the  signorino  take  the 
tiller,  and  you  with  the  others  stand  by  to 
haul  the  boat  alongside  quickly  at  the 
word." 

The  man  obeyed,  surprised,  but  silent. 
The  others  stirred,  and  cocked  their  ears  up 
at  this.  I  heard  their  murmurs.  "What 
now?  Are  we  going  to  run  in  somewhere 
and  take  to  our  heels  ?  The  padrone  knows 
what  he  is  doing." 

Dominic  went  forward.  He  paused  to 
look  down  at  Cesar,  who,  as  I  have  said  be- 
fore, was  lying  full  length  face  down  by  the 
foremast,  then  stepped  over  him,  and  dived 
301 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

out  of  my  sight  under  the  foresail.  I  saw 
nothing  ahead.  It  was  impossible  for  me 
to  see  anything  except  the  foresail  open 
and  still,  like  a  great  shadowy  wing.  But 
Dominic  had  his  bearings.  His  voice  came 
to  me  from  forward,  in  a  just  audible  cry: 

"Now,  signorino!,, 

I  bore  on  the  tiller,  as  instructed  before. 
Again  I  heard  him  faintly,  and  then  I  had 
only  to  hold  her  straight.  No  ship  ran  so 
joyously  to  her  death  before.  She  rose  and 
fell,  as  if  floating  in  space,  and  darted  for- 
ward, whizzing  like  an  arrow.  Dominic, 
stooping  under  the  foot  of  the  foresail, 
reappeared,  and  stood  steadying  himself 
against  the  mast,  with  a  raised  forefinger  in 
an  attitude  of  expectant  attention.  A  sec- 
ond before  the  shock  his  arm  fell  down  by 
his  side.  At  that  I  set  my  teeth.  And 
then — 

Talk  of  splintered  planks  and  smashed 
timbers!  This  shipwreck  lies  upon  my  soul 
with  the  dread  and  horror  of  a  homicide, 
with  the  unforgettable  remorse  of  having 
crushed  a  living,  faithful  heart  at  a  single 
blow.  At  one  moment  the  rush  and  the 
302 


The  "Tremolino" 

soaring  swing  of  speed;  the  next  a  crash, 
and  death,  stillness — a  moment  of  horrible 
immobility,  with  the  song  of  the  wind 
changed  to  a  strident  wail,  and  the  heavy- 
waters  boiling  up  menacing  and  sluggish 
around  the  corpse.  I  saw  in  a  distracting 
minute  the  foreyard  fly  fore-and-aft  with  a 
brutal  swing,  the  men  all  in  a  heap,  cursing 
with  fear,  and  hauling  frantically  at  the  line 
of  the  boat.  With  a  strange  welcoming  of 
the  familiar  I  saw  also  Cesar  among  them, 
and  recognized  Dominic's  old,  well-known, 
effective  gesture,  the  horizontal  sweep  of  his 
powerful  arm.  I  recollect  distinctly  saying 
to  myself,  "Cesar  must  go  down,  of  course," 
and  then,  as  I  was  scrambling  on  all  fours, 
the  swinging  tiller  I  had  let  go  caught  me  a 
crack  under  the  ear,  and  knocked  me  over 
senseless. 

I  don't  think  I  was  actually  unconscious 
for  more  than  a  few  minutes,  but  when  I 
came  to  myself  the  dinghy  was  driving  be- 
fore the  wind  into  a  sheltered  cove,  two  men 
just  keeping  her  straight  with  their  oars. 
Dominic,  with  his  arm  round  my  shoulders, 
supported  me  in  the  stern-sheets. 
Z°3 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

We  landed  in  a  familiar  part  of  the  coun- 
try. Dominic  took  one  of  the  boat's  oars 
with  him.  I  suppose  he  was  thinking  of 
the  stream  we  would  have  presently  to 
cross,  on  which  there  was  a  miserable  speci- 
men of  a  punt,  often  robbed  of  its  pole. 
But  first  of  all  we  had  to  ascend  the  ridge  of 
land  at  the  back  of  the  Cape.  He  helped 
me  up.  I  was  dizzy.  My  head  felt  very 
large  and  heavy.  At  the  top  of  the  ascent 
I  clung  to  him,  and  we  stopped  to  rest. 

To  the  right,  below  us,  the  wide,  smoky 
bay  was  empty.  Dominic  had  kept  his 
word.  There  was  not  a  chip  to  be  seen 
around  the  black  rock  from  which  the 
Tremolino,  with  her  plucky  heart  crushed 
at  one  blow,  had  slipped  off  into  deep  water 
to  her  eternal  rest.  The  vastness  of  the 
open  sea  was  smothered  in  driving  mists, 
and  in  the  centre  of  the  thinning  squall, 
phantom-like,  under  a  frightful  press  of  can- 
vas, the  unconscious  guardacosta  dashed  on, 
still  chasing  to  the  northward.  Our  men 
were  already  descending  the  reverse  slope  to 
look  for  that  punt  which  we  knew  from  ex- 
perience was  not  always  to  be  found  easily. 
3°4 


The  "Tremolino" 

I  looked  after  them  with  dazed,  misty  eyes. 
One,  two,  three,  four. 

"Dominic,  where's  Cesar?"  I  cried. 

As  if  repulsing  the  very  sound  of  the 
name,  the  padrone  made  that  ample,  sweep- 
ing, knocking-down  gesture.  I  stepped  back 
a  pace  and  stared  at  him  fearfully.  His 
open  shirt  uncovered  his  muscular  neck  and 
the  thick  hair  on  his  chest.  He  planted  the 
oar  upright  in  the  soft  soil,  and  rolling  up 
slowly  his  right  sleeve,  extended  the  bare 
arm  before  my  face. 

"This,"  he  began,  with  an  extreme  de- 
liberation, whose  superhuman  restraint  vi- 
brated with  the  suppressed  violence  of  his 
feelings,  "is  the  arm  which  delivered  the 
blow.  I  am  afraid  it  is  your  own  gold  that 
did  the  rest.  I  forgot  all  about  your 
money."  He  clasped  his  hands  together  in 
sudden  distress.  "I  forgot,  I  forgot,"  he 
repeated,  disconsolately. 

"Cesar  stole  the  belt?"  I  stammered  out, 
bewildered. 

"And  who  else?  Canallia!  He  must 
have  been  spying  on  you  for  days.  And  he 
did  the  whole  thing.  Absent  all  day  in 
30S 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Barcelona.  Traditore!  Sold  his  jacket — to 
hire  a  horse.  Ha!  ha!  A  good  affair!  I 
tell  you  it  was  he  who  set  him  at  us.  .  .  ." 

Dominic  pointed  at  the  sea,  where  the 
guardacosta  was  a  mere  dark  speck.  His 
chin  dropped  on  his  breast. 

"...  On  information, "  he  murmured,  in  a 
gloomy  voice.  "A  Cervoni!  Oh!  my  poor 
brother!   .    .    ." 

"And  you  drowned  him,"  I  said,  feebly. 

"  I  struck  once,  and  the  wretch  went  down 
like  a  stone — with  the  gold.  Yes.  But  he 
had  time  to  read  in  my  eyes  that  nothing 
could  save  him  while  I  was  alive.  And  had 
I  not  the  right  —  I,  Dominic  Cervoni,  pa- 
drone, who  brought  him  aboard  your  fellucca 
— my  nephew  a  traitor?" 

He  pulled  the  oar  out  of  the  ground  and 
helped  me  carefully  down  the  slope.  All 
the  time  he  never  once  looked  me  in  the 
face.  He  punted  us  over,  then  shouldered 
the  oar  again  and  waited  till  our  men  were 
at  some  distance  before  he  offered  me  his 
arm.  After  we  had  gone  a  little  way,  the 
fishing  hamlet  we  were  making  for  came  into 
view.  Dominic  stopped. 
306 


The  "Tremolino" 

"Do  you  think  you  can  make  your  way 
as  far  as  the  houses  by  yourself?"  he  asked 
me,  quietly. 

"Yes,  I  think  so.  But  why?  Where  are 
you  going,  Dominic?" 

"Anywhere.  What  a  question!  Signo- 
rino,  you  are  but  little  more  than  a  boy  to 
ask  such  a  question  of  a  man  having  this 
tale  in  his  family.  Ah!  Traditore!  What 
made  me  ever  own  that  spawn  of  a  hungry 
devil  for  our  own  blood!  Thief,  cheat, 
coward,  liar — other  men  can  deal  with  that. 
But  I  was  his  uncle,  and  so  ...  I  wish  he 
had  poisoned  me — charogne !  But  this :  that 
I,  a  confidential  man  and  a  Corsican,  should 
have  to  ask  your  pardon  for  bringing  on 
board  your  vessel,  of  which  I  was  padrone, 
a  Cervoni  who  has  betrayed  you — a  traitor! 
— that  is  too  much.  It  is  too  much.  Well, 
I  beg  your  pardon;  and  you  may  spit  in 
Dominic's  face  because  a  traitor  of  our 
blood  taints  us  all.  A  theft  may  be  made 
good  between  men,  a  lie  may  be  set  right,  a 
death  avenged,  but  what  can  one  do  to 
atone  for  a  treachery  like  this?  .  .  .  Noth- 
ing. 

307 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

*  He  turned  and  walked  away  from  me 
along  the  bank  of  the  stream,  flourishing  a 
vengeful  arm  and  repeating  to  himself  slow- 
ly, with  savage  emphasis:  "Ah!  Canaille! 
Canaille!  Canaille!  ..."  He  left  me  there 
trembling  with  weakness  and  mute  with 
awe.  Unable  to  make  a  sound,  I  gazed 
after  the  strangely  desolate  figure  of  that 
seaman  carrying  an  oar  on  his  shoulder  up  a 
barren,  rock-strewn  ravine  under  the  dreary 
leaden  sky  of  Tremolino's  last  day.  Thus, 
walking  deliberately,  with  his  back  to  the 
sea,  Dominic  vanished  from  my  sight. 

With  the  quality  of  our  desires,  thoughts, 
and  wonder  proportioned  to  our  infinite  lit- 
tleness, we  measure  even  time  itself  by  our 
own  stature.  Imprisoned  in  the  house  of 
personal  illusions,  thirty  centuries  in  man- 
kind's history  seem  less  to  look  back  upon 
than  thirty  years  of  our  own  life.  And 
Dominic  Cervoni  takes  his  place  in  my 
memory  by  the  side  of  the  legendary  wan- 
derer on  the  sea  of  marvels  and  terrors,  by 
the  side  of  the  fatal  and  impious  adventurer, 
to  whom  the  evoked  shade  of  the  soothsayer 
predicted  a  journey  inland  with  an  oar  on 
308 


The  "Tremolino" 

his  shoulder,  till  he  met  men  who  had  never 
set  eyes  on  ships  and  oars.  It  seems  to  me 
I  can  see  them  side  by  side  in  the  twilight 
of  an  arid  land,  the  unfortunate  possessors 
of  the  secret  lore  of  the  sea,  bearing  the  em- 
blem of  their  hard  calling  on  their  shoulders, 
surrounded  by  silent  and  curious  men:  even 
as  I,  too,  having  turned  my  back  upon  the 
sea,  am  bearing  .those  few  pages  in  the  twi- 
light, with  the  hope  of  finding  in  an  inland 
valley  the  silent  welcome  of  some  patient 
listener. 


The   Heroic   Age 


FELLOW  has  now  no  chance 
of  promotion  unless  he  jumps 
into  the  muzzle  of  a  gun  and 
crawls  out  of  the  touch-hole.' ' 
He  who,  a  hundred  years 
ago,  more  or  less,  pronounced  the  above 
words  in  the  uneasiness  of  his  heart,  thirst- 
ing for  professional  distinction,  was  a  young 
naval  officer.  Of  his  life,  career,  achieve- 
ments, and  end,  nothing  is  preserved  for  the 
'edification  of  his  young  successors  in  the 
fleet  of  to-day  —  nothing  but  this  phrase, 
which,  sailor-like  in  the  simplicity  of  per- 
sonal sentiment  and  strength  of  graphic  ex- 
pression, embodies  the  spirit  of  the  epoch. 
This  obscure  but  vigorous  testimony  has  its 
price,  its  significance,  and  its  lesson.  It 
comes  to  us  from  a  worthy  ancestor.  We 
do  not  know  whether  he  lived  long  enough 
310 


The  Heroic  Age 

for  a  chance  of  that  promotion  whose  way- 
was  so  arduous.  He  belongs  to  the  great 
array  of  the  unknown — who  are  great,  in- 
deed, by  the  sum  total  of  the  devoted  effort 
put  out,  and  the  colossal  scale  of  success  at- 
tained by  their  insatiable  and  steadfast  am- 
bition. We  do  not  know  his  name ;  we  only 
know  of  him  what  is  material  for  us  to 
know — that  he  was  never  backward  on  oc- 
casions of  desperate  service.  We  have  this 
on  the  authority  of  a  distinguished  seaman 
of  Nelson's  time.  Departing  this  life  as  Ad- 
miral of  the  Fleet  on  the  eve  of  the  Crimean 
War,  Sir  Thomas  Byam  Martin  has  recorded 
for  us  among  his  all  too  short  autobiographi- 
cal notes  these  few  characteristic  words  ut- 
tered by  one  young  man  of  the  many  who 
must  have  felt  that  particular  inconvenience 
of  a  heroic  age. 

The  distinguished  Admiral  had  lived 
through  it  himself,  and  was  a  good  judge  of 
what  was  expected  in  those  days  from  men 
and  ships.  A  brilliant  frigate  captain,  a 
man  of  sound  judgment,  of  dashing  bravery 
and  of  serene  mind,  scrupulously  concerned 
for  the  welfare  and  honor  of  the  navy,  he 
31* 


The  Mirror  of  the   Sea 

missed  a  larger  fame  only  by  the  chances  of 
the  service.  We  may  well  quote  on  this 
day  the  words  written  of  Nelson,  in  the  de- 
cline of  a  well-spent  life,  by  Sir  T.  B.  Martin, 
who  died  just  fifty  years  ago  on  the  very  an- 
niversary of  Trafalgar. 

"Nelson's  nobleness  of  mind  was  a  promi- 
nent and  beautiful  part  of  his  character. 
His  foibles — faults  if  you  like — will  never  be 
dwelt  upon  in  any  memorandum  of  mine,,, 
he  declares,  and  goes  on — "he  whose  splen- 
did and  matchless  achievements  will  be  re- 
membered with  admiration  while  there  is 
gratitude  in  the  hearts  of  Britons,  or  while 
a  ship  floats  upon  the  ocean;  he  whose  ex- 
ample on  the  breaking  out  of  the  war  gave 
so  chivalrous  an  impulse  to  the  younger  men 
of  the  service  that  all  rushed  into  rivalry  of 
daring  which  disdained  every  warning  of 
prudence,  and  led  to  acts  of  heroic  enter- 
prise which  tended  greatly  to  exalt  the  glory 
of  our  nation." 

These  are  his  words,  and  they  are  true. 

The  dashing  young  frigate  captain,  the  man 

who  in  middle  age  was  nothing  loath  to  give 

chase  single-handed  in  his  seventy-four  to  a 

312 


The  Heroic  Age 

whole  fleet,  the  man  of  enterprise  and  con- 
summate judgment,  the  old  Admiral  of  the 
Fleet,  the  good  and  trusted  servant  of  his 
country  under  two  kings  and  a  queen,  had 
felt  correctly  Nelson's  influence,  and  ex- 
pressed himself  with  precision  out  of  the  ful- 
ness of  his  seaman's  heart. 

"Exalted,"  he  wrote,  not  "augmented." 
And  therein  his  feeling  and  his  pen  captured 
the  very  truth.  Other  men  there  were 
ready  and  able  to  add  to  the  treasure  of 
victories  the  British  navy  has  given  to  the 
nation.  It  was  the  lot  of  Lord  Nelson  to 
exalt  all  this  glory.  Exalt!  the  word  seems 
to  be  created  for  the  man. 


The  British  navy  may  well  have  ceased  to 
count  its  victories.  It  is  rich  beyond  the 
wildest  dreams  of  success  and  fame.  It 
may  well,  rather,  on  a  culminating  day  of 
its  history,  cast  about  for  the  memory  of 
some  reverses  to  appease  the  jealous  fates 
which  attend  the  prosperity  and  triumphs 
of  a  nation.  It  holds,  indeed,  the  heaviest 
3*3 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

inheritance  that  has  ever  been  intrusted  to 
the  courage  and  fidelity  of  armed  men. 

It  is  too  great  for  mere  pride.  It  should 
make  the  seamen  of  to-day  humble  in  the 
secret  of  their  hearts,  and  indomitable  in 
their  unspoken  resolution.  In  all  the  rec- 
ords of  history  there  has  never  been  a  time 
when  a  victorious  fortune  has  been  so  faith- 
ful to  men  making  war  upon  the  sea.  And 
it  must  be  confessed  that  on  their  part  they 
knew  how  to  be  faithful  to  their  victorious 
fortune.  They  were  exalted.  They  were 
always  watching  for  her  smile ;  night  or  day, 
fair  weather  or  foul,  they  waited  for  her 
slightest  sign  with  the  offering  of  their  stout 
hearts  in  their  hands.  And  for  the  inspira- 
tion of  this  high  constancy  they  were  in- 
debted to  Lord  Nelson  alone.  Whatever 
earthly  affection  he  abandoned  or  grasped, 
the  great  Admiral  was  always,  before  all, 
beyond  all,  a  lover  of  fame.  He  loved  her 
jealously,  with  an  inextinguishable  ardor 
and  an  insatiable  desire — he  loved  her  with 
a  masterful  devotion  and  an  infinite  trust- 
fulness. In  the  plenitude  of  his  passion  he 
was  an  exacting  lover.  And  she  never  be- 
3i4 


The  Heroic  Age 

trayed  the  greatness  of  his  trust!  She  at- 
tended him  to  the  end  of  his  life,  and  he 
died  pressing  her  last  gift  (nineteen  prizes) 
to  his  breast.  "Anchor,  Hardy — anchor !" 
was  as  much  the  cry  of  an  ardent  lover  as  of 
a  consummate  seaman.  Thus  he  would  hug 
to  his  breast  the  last  gift  of  fame. 

It  was  this  ardor  which  made  him  great. 
He  was  a  flaming  example  to  the  wooers  of 
glorious  fortune.'  There  have  been  great 
officers  before — Lord  Hood,  for  instance, 
whom  he  himself  regarded  as  the  greatest 
sea-officer  England  ever  had.  A  long  suc- 
cession of  great  commanders  opened  the  sea 
to  the  vast  range  of  Nelson's  genius.  His 
time  had  come ;  and,  after  the  great  sea-offi- 
cers, the  great  naval  tradition  passed  into 
the  keeping  of  a  great  man.  Not  the  least 
glory  of  the  navy  is  that  it  understood  Nel- 
son. Lord  Hood  trusted  him.  Admiral 
Keith  told  him:  "We  can't  spare  you  either 
as  Captain  or  Admiral."  Earl  St.  Vincent 
put  into  his  hands,  untrammelled  by  orders, 
a  division  of  his  fleet,  and  Sir  Hyde  Parker 
gave  him  two  more  ships  at  Copenhagen 
than  he  had  asked  for.  So  much  for  the 
"  315 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

chiefs;  the  rest  of  the  navy  surrendered  to 
him  their  devoted  affection,  trust,  and  ad- 
miration. In  return  he  gave  them  no  less 
than  his  own  exalted  soul.  He  breathed  into 
them  his  own  ardor  and  his  own  ambition. 
In  a  few  short  years  he  revolutionized,  not 
the  strategy  or  tactics  of  sea- warfare,  but  the 
very  conception  of  victory  itseif .  And  this  is 
genius.  In  that  alone,  through  the  fidelity 
of  his  fortune  and  the  power  of  his  inspi- 
ration, he  stands  unique  among  the  leaders 
of  fleets  and  sailors.  He  brought  heroism 
into  the  line  of  duty.  Verily  he  is  a  terrible 
ancestor. 

And  the  men  of  his  day  loved  him.  They 
loved  him  not  only  as  victorious  armies 
have  loved  great  commanders;  they  loved 
him  with  a  more  intimate  feeling  as  one  of 
themselves.  In  the  words  of  a  contem- 
porary, he  had  "a  most  happy  way  of  gain- 
ing the  affectionate  respect  of  all  who  had 
the  felicity  to  serve  under  his  command." 

To  be  so  great  and  to  remain  so  accessible 
to  the  affection  of  one's  fellow-men  is  the 
mark  of  exceptional  humanity.  Lord  Nel- 
son's greatness  was  very  human.  It  had  a 
316 


The  Heroic  Age 

moral  basis;  it  needed  to  feel  itself  sur- 
rounded by  the  warm  devotion  of  a  band  of 
brothers.  He  was  vain  and  tender.  The 
love  and  admiration  which  the  navy  gave 
him  so  unreservedly  soothed  the  restless- 
ness of  his  professional  pride.  He  trusted 
them  as  much  as  they  trusted  him.  He  was 
a  seaman  of  seamen.  Sir  T.  B.  Martin 
states  that  he  never  conversed  with  any 
officer  who  had  served  under  Nelson  "with- 
out hearing  the  heartiest  expressions  of  at- 
tachment to  his  person  and  admiration  of 
his  frank  and  conciliatory  manner  to  his 
subordinates."  And  Sir  Robert  Stopford, 
who  commanded  one  of  the  ships  with 
which  Nelson  chased  to  the  West  Indies  a 
fleet  nearly  double  in  number,  says  in  a  let- 
ter: "We  are  half-starved  and  otherwise  in- 
convenienced by  being  so  long  out  of  port, 
but  our  reward  is  that  we  are  with  Nelson." 
This  heroic  spirit  of  daring  and  endur- 
ance, in  which  all  public  and  private  differ- 
ences were  sunk  throughout  the  whole  fleet, 
is  Lord  Nelson's  great  legacy,  triply  sealed 
by  the  victorious  impress  of  the  Nile,  Copen- 
hagen, and  Trafalgar.  This  is  a  legacy 
3i7 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

whose  value  the  changes  of  time  cannot 
affect.  The  men  and  the  ships  he  knew 
how  to  lead  lovingly  to  the  work  of  courage 
and  the  reward  of  glory  have  passed  away, 
but  Nelson's  uplifting  touch  remains  in  the 
standard  of  achievement  he  has  set  for  all 
time.  The  principles  of  strategy  may  be 
immutable.  It  is  certain  they  have  been, 
and  shall  be  again,  disregarded  from  timidity, 
from  blindness,  through  infirmity  of  pur- 
pose. The  tactics  of  great  captains  on  land 
and  sea  can  be  infinitely  discussed.  The 
first  object  of  tactics  is  to  close  with  the  ad- 
versary on  terms  of  the  greatest  possible  ad- 
vantage; yet  no  hard  and  fast  rules  can  be 
drawn  from  experience,  for  this  capital  rea- 
son, among  others — that  the  quality  of  the 
adversary  is  a  variable  element  in  the  prob- 
lem. The  tactics  of  Lord  Nelson  have  been 
amply  discussed,  with  much  pride  and  some 
profit.  And  yet,  truly,  they  are  already  of 
but  archaic  interest.  A  very  few  years 
more  and  the  hazardous  difficulties  of  hand- 
ling a  fleet  under  canvas  shall  have  passed 
beyond  the  conception  of  seamen  who  hold 
in  trust  for  their  country  Lord  Nelson's 
3i8 


The  Heroic  Age 

legacy  of  heroic  spirit.  The  change  in  the 
character  of  the  ships  is  too  great  and  too 
radical.  It  is  good  and  proper  to  study  the 
acts  of  great  men  with  thoughtful  reverence, 
but  already  the  precise  intention  of  Lord 
Nelson's  famous  memorandum  seems  to  lie 
under  that  veil  which  Time  throws  over  the 
clearest  conceptions  of  every  great  art.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten  that  this  was  the  first 
time  when  Nelson,  commanding  in  chief, 
had  his  opponents  under  way  —  the  first 
time  and  the  last.  Had  he  lived,  had  there 
been  other  fleets  left  to  oppose  him,  we 
would,  perhaps,  have  learned  something 
more  of  his  greatness  as  a  sea-officer.  Noth- 
ing could  have  been  added  to  his  greatness 
as  a  leader.  All  that  can  be  affirmed  is, 
that  on  no  other  day  of  his  short  and  glori- 
ous career  was  Lord  Nelson  more  splendidly 
true  to  his  genius  and  to  his  country's 
fortune. 


And  yet  the  fact  remains  that,  had  the 
wind  failed  and  the  fleet  lost  steerage-way, 
319 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

or,  worse  still,  had  it  been  taken  aback  from 
the  eastward,  with  its  leaders  within  short 
range  of  the  enemy's  guns,  nothing,  it 
seems,  could  have  saved  the  headmost  ships 
from  capture  or  destruction.  No  skill  of  a 
great  sea-officer  would  have  availed  in  such 
a  contingency.  Lord  Nelson  was  more  than 
that,  and  his  genius  would  have  remained 
undiminished  by  defeat.  But  obviously  tac- 
tics, which  are  so  much  at  the  mercy  of 
irremediable  accident,  must  seem  to  a 
modern  seaman  a  poor  matter  of  study. 
The  commander-in-chief  in  the  great  fleet 
action  that  will  take  its  place  next  to  the 
battle  of  Trafalgar  in  the  history  of  the 
British  navy  will  have  no  such  anxiety,  and 
will  feel  the  weight  of  no  such  dependence. 
For  a  hundred  years  now  no  British  fleet 
has  engaged  the  enemy  in  line  of  battle. 
A  hundred  years  is  a  long  time,  but  the  dif- 
ference of  modern  conditions  is  enormous. 
The  gulf  is  great.  Had  the  last  great  fight 
of  the  English  navy  been  that  of  the  ist 
of  June,  for  instance,  had  there  been  no 
Nelson's  victories,  it  would  have  been  well- 
nigh  impassable.  The  great  Admiral's  slight 
320 


The  Heroic  Age 

and  passion-worn  figure  stands  at  the  part- 
ing of  the  ways.  He  had  the  audacity  of 
genius,  and  a  prophetic  inspiration. 

The  modern  naval  man  must  feel  that  tjie 
time  has  come  for  the  tactical  practice  of  the 
great  sea-officers  of  the  past  to  be  laid  by  in 
the  temple  of  august  memories.  The  fleet 
tactics  of  the  sailing- days  have  turned  on 
two  points:  the  deadly  nature  of  a  raking 
fire,  and  the  dread,  natural  to  a  commander 
dependent  upon  the  winds,  to  find  at  some 
crucial  moment  part  of  his  fleet  thrown 
hopelessly  to  leeward.  These  two  points 
were  of  the  very  essence  of  sailing  tactics, 
and  these  two  points  have  been  eliminated 
from  the  modern  tactical  problem  by  the 
changes  of  propulsion  and  armament.  Lord 
Nelson  was  the  first  to  disregard  them  with 
conviction  and  audacity  sustained  by  an 
unbounded  trust  in  the  men  he  led.  This 
conviction,  this  audacity,  and  this  trust 
stand  out  from  among  the  lines  of  the  cele- 
brated memorandum,  which  is  but  a  declara- 
tion of  his  faith  in  a  crushing  superiority  of 
fire  as  the  only  means  of  victory  and  the 
only  aim  of  sound  tactics.  Under  the  dim- 
321 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

culties  of  the  then  existing  conditions  he 
strove  for  that,  and  for  that  alone,  putting 
his  faith  into  practice  against  every  risk. 
And  in  that  exclusive  faith  Lord  Nelson  ap- 
pears to  us  as  the  first  of  the  moderns. 

Against  every  risk,  I  have  said;  and  the 
men  of  to-day,  born  and  bred  to  the  use  of 
steam,  can  hardly  realize  how  much  of  that 
risk  was  in  the  weather.  Except  at  the 
Nile,  where  the  conditions  were  ideal  for  en- 
gaging a  fleet  moored  in  shallow  water,  Lord 
Nelson  was  not  lucky  in  his  weather.  Prac- 
tically it  was  nothing  but  a  quite  unusual 
failure  of  the  wind  which  cost  him  his  arm 
during  the  Teneriffe  expedition.  On  Trafal- 
gar Day  the  weather  was  not  so  much  un- 
favorable as  extremely  dangerous. 

It  was  one  of  these  covered  days  of  fitful 
sunshine,  of  light,  unsteady  winds,  with  a 
swell  from  the  westward,  and  hazy  in  gen- 
eral, but  with  the  land  about  the  Cape  at 
times  distinctly  visible.  It  has  been  my  lot 
to  look  with  reverence  upon  the  very  spot 
more  than  once,  and  for  many  hours  to- 
gether. All  but  thirty  years  ago,  certain 
exceptional  circumstances  made  me  very 
323 


The  Heroic  Age 

familiar  for  a  time  with  that  bight  in  the 
Spanish  coast  which  would  be  inclosed 
within  a  straight  line  drawn  from  Faro  to 
Spartel.  My  well  -  remembered  experience 
has  convinced  me  that,  in  that  corner  of  the 
ocean,  once  the  wind  has  got  to  the  north- 
ward of  west  (as  it  did  on  the  20th,  taking 
the  British  fleet  aback),  appearances  of 
westerly  weather  go  for  nothing,  and  that  it 
is  infinitely  more  likely  to  veer  right  round 
to  the  east  than  to  shift  back  again.  It  was 
in  those  conditions  that,  at  seven  on  the 
morning  of  the  21st,  the  signal  for  the  fleet 
to  bear  up  and  steer  east  was  made.  Hold- 
ing a  clear  recollection  of  these  languid 
easterly  sighs  rippling  unexpectedly  against 
the  run  of  the  smooth  swell,  with  no  other 
warning  than  a  ten -minutes'  calm  and  a 
queer  darkening  of  the  coast-line,  I  cannot 
think,  without  a  gasp  of  professional  awe, 
of  that  fateful  moment.  Perhaps  personal 
experience,  at  a  time  of  life  when  responsi- 
bility had  a  special  freshness  and  impor- 
tance, has  induced  me  to  exaggerate  to  my- 
self the  danger  of  the  weather.  The  great 
Admiral  and  good  seaman  could  read  aright 
323 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

the  signs  of  sea  and  sky,  as  his  order  to  pre- 
pare to  anchor  at  the  end  of  the  day  suffi- 
ciently proves;  but,  all  the  same,  the  mere 
idea  of  these  baffling  easterly  airs,  coming 
on  at  any  time  within  half  an  hour  or  so, 
after  the  Victory  fired  her  first  broadside,  is 
enough  to  take  one's  breath  away,  with  the 
image  of  the  rearmost  ships  of  both  divi- 
sions falling  off,  unmanageable,  broadside 
on  to  the  westerly  swell,  and  of  two  British 
admirals  in  desperate  jeopardy.  To  this 
day  I  cannot  free  myself  from  the  impres- 
sion that,  for  some  forty  minutes,  the  fate 
of  the  great  battle  hung  upon  a  breath  of 
wind  such  as  I  have  felt  stealing  from  be- 
hind, as  it  were,  upon  my  cheek  while  en- 
gaged in  looking  to  the  westward  for  the 
signs  of  the  true  weather. 

Never  more  shall  British  seamen  going 
into  action  have  to  trust  the  success  of  their 
valor  to  a  breath  of  wind.  The  God  of  gales 
and  battles  favoring  her  arms  to  the  last, 
has  let  the  sun  of  England's  sailing-fleet  and 
of  its  greatest  master  set  in  unclouded 
glory.  And  now  the  old  ships  and  their 
men  are  gone;  the  new  ships  and  the  new 
324 


The  Heroic  Age 

men,  many  of  them  bearing  the  old,  auspi- 
cious names,  have  taken  up  their  watch  on 
the  stern  and  impartial  sea,  which  offers  no 
opportunities  but  to  those  who  know  how  to 
grasp  them  with  a  ready  hand  and  an  un- 
daunted heart. 


This  the  navy  of  the  Twenty  Years'  War 
knew  well  how  to  do,  and  never  better  than 
when  Lord  Nelson  had  breathed  into  its 
soul  his  own  passion  of  honor  and  fame.  It 
was  a  fortunate  navy.  Its  victories  were 
no  mere  smashing  of  helpless  ships  and 
massacres  of  cowed  men.  It  was  spared 
that  cruel  favor,  for  which  no  brave  heart 
had  ever  prayed.  It  was  fortunate  in  its 
adversaries.  I  say  adversaries,  for  on  this 
day  of  proud  memories  we  should  avoid  the 
word  "enemies,"  whose  hostile  sound  per- 
petuates the  antagonisms  and  strife  of  na- 
tions, so  irremediable,  perhaps,  so  fateful — 
and  also  so  vain.  War  is  one  of  the  gifts  of 
life;  but,  alas!  no  war  appears  so  very  neces- 
sary when  time  has  laid  its  soothing  hand 
325 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

upon  the  passionate  misunderstandings  and 
the  passionate  desires  of  great  peoples. 
"Le  temps,"  as  a  distinguished  Frenchman 
has  said,  "est  un  galant  homme."  He 
fosters  the  spirit  of  concord  and  justice,  in 
whose  work  there  is  as  much  glory  to  be 
reaped  as  in  the  deeds  of  arms. 

One  of  them  disorganized  by  revolution- 
ary changes,  the  other  rusted  in  the  neglect 
of  a  decayed  monarchy,  the  two  fleets  op- 
posed to  us  entered  the  contest  with  odds 
against  them  from  the  first.  By  the  merit 
of  our  daring  and  our  faithfulness,  and  the 
genius  of  a  great  leader,  we  have  in  the 
course  of  the  war  augmented  our  advantage 
and  kept  it  to  the  last.  But  in  the  exulting 
illusion  of  irresistible  might  a  long  series  of 
military  successes  brings  to  a  nation  the  less 
obvious  aspect  of  such  a  fortune  may  per- 
chance be  lost  to  view.  The  old  navy  in  its 
last  days  earned  a  fame  that  no  belittling 
malevolence  dare  cavil  at.  And  this  su- 
preme favor  they  owe  to  their  adversaries 
alone.  * 

Deprived  by  an  ill-starred  fortune  of  that 
self-confidence  which  strengthens  the  hands 
326 


The  Heroic  Age 

of  an  armed  host,  impaired  in  skill  but  not 
in  courage,  it  may  safely  be  said  that  our 
adversaries  managed  yet  to  make  a  better 
fight  of  it  in  1797  than  they  did  in  1793. 
Later  still,  the  resistance  offered  at  the  Nile 
was  all,  and  more  than  all,  that  could  be 
demanded  from  seamen,  who,  unless  blind 
or  without  understanding,  must  have  seen 
their  doom  sealed  from  the  moment  that 
the  Goliath,  bearing  up  under  the  bows  of 
the  Guerrier,  took  up  an  inshore  berth.  The 
combined  fleets  of  1805,  just  come  out  of 
port,  and  attended  by  nothing  but  the  dis- 
turbing memories  of  reverses,  presented  to 
our  approach  a  determined  front,  on  which 
Captain  Blackwood,  in  a  knightly  spirit, 
congratulated  his  admiral.  By  the  exer- 
tions of  their  valor  our  adversaries  have 
but  added  a  greater  lustre  to  our  arms.  No 
friend  could  have  done  more,  for  even  in 
war,  which  severs  for  a  time  all  the  senti- 
ments of  human  fellowship,  this  subtle  bond 
of  association  remains  between  brave  men 
— that  the  final  testimony  to  the  value  of 
victory  must  be  received  at  the  hands  of 
the  vanquished. 

327 


The  Mirror  of  the  Sea 

Those  that  from  the  heat  of  that  battle 
sank  together  to  their  repose  in  the  cool 
depths  of  the  ocean  would  not  understand 
the  watchwords  of  our  day,  would  gaze 
with  amazed  eyes  at  the  engines  of  our 
strife.  All  passes,  all  changes:  the  ani- 
mosity of  peoples,  the  tactics  of  fleets,  the 
forms  of  ships ;  and  even  the  sea  itself  seems 
to  wear  a  different  and  diminished  aspect 
from  the  sea  of  Lord  Nelson's  day.  In  this 
ceaseless  rush  of  shadows  and  shades,  that, 
like  the  fantastic  forms  of  clouds  cast  darkly 
upon  the  waters  on  a  windy  day,  fly  past  us 
to  fall  headlong  below  the  hard  edge  of  an 
implacable  horizon,  we  must  turn  to  the 
national  spirit,  which,  superior  in  its  force 
and  continuity  to  good  and  evil  fortune,  can 
alone  give  us  the  feeling  of  an  enduring  ex- 
istence and  of  an  invincible  power  against 
the  fates. 

Like  a  subtle  and  mysterious  elixir  poured 
into  the  perishable  clay  of  successive  gen- 
erations, it  grows  in  truth,  splendor,  and 
potency  with  the  march  of  ages.  In  its  in- 
corruptible flow  all  round  the  globe  of  the 
earth  it  preserves  from  the  decay  and  for- 
328 


The  Heroic  Age 

getfulness  of  death  the  greatness  of  our 
great  men,  and  among  them  the  passionate 
and  gentle  greatness  of  Nelson,  the  nature 
of  whose  genius  was,  on  the  faith  of  a  brave 
seaman  and  distinguished  Admiral,  such  as 
to  "Exalt  the  glory  of  our  nation." 


THE    END 


*#& 


ntK-S,    ' 


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